


Dawn War

by Iscalta



Series: Dawn Trilogy [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: High Fantasy, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-12 17:56:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 32,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28764414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iscalta/pseuds/Iscalta
Summary: With the Wall fallen, the Others are free to begin the invasion of Westeros. Conflict on a cataclysmic scale engulfs the characters as thoughts of politics, personal advantage and the game of thrones are swept aside in the flames of war.
Relationships: Alys Karstark/Sigorn, Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Bran Stark/Meera Reed, Gilly/Samwell Tarly, Harrold Hardyng/Sansa Stark, Jaime Lannister & Brienne of Tarth, Jon Snow/Daenerys Targaryen, Missandei/Grey Worm
Series: Dawn Trilogy [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2109345
Comments: 48
Kudos: 22





	1. Bran I

He woke in a sweat despite the cold that had seeped into his flesh. Into Meera’s as well, despite his arms around her and the babe. _They’re ready,_ he knew at once. _Ready to march on the Wall._ How he managed to glimpse into the future so cleanly was beyond Bran but under the circumstances he appreciated any help that could be given. _Had I been awing above them, I might have thought it happening for true._ Instead he stood among them, the endless dead hidden in the trees, watching as the cold giant sounded his horn and the Others themselves turned the huge shards of wall into a blizzard that spanned the breadth of Westeros. _Just to dump it on our heads before they come calling._ _We ought to make sure anyone north of Last Hearth pulls back to the castle. I want to see what’s going on, at least._ When he reached for a raven though, it was as if every bird he could find turned to mist, turned to fog in his grasp. He got only the haziest glimpses of Queenscrown, returning to his bedchamber feeling wholly worse. A slight movement out of the corner of his eye took his mind off the Gift. The smallest pair of grey eyes bright despite the predawn darkness were locked on him over Meera’s shoulder. _Good morning, my prince,_ Bran thought. His princess was a light sleeper, he learned that in the years they spent in the Raven’s hollow. Even with a whisper he might rouse her, and he was loath to do so. The eyes took in Bran’s face, the infant prince looking at him suspiciously in his two-month-old way. _He never cries,_ Bran wondered. _He fusses when he’s hungry or when he needs his clout changed. Apart from that, he never makes a sound._ Faintly Bran couldn’t help but worry and he knew Meera did as well, but her parents didn’t seem overly concerned and so it was their experience he relied on to soothe the butterflies in his stomach. _Lord Howland has more to worry about than one quiet babe._ Whenever he wasn’t with Meera and his grandson, he was everywhere else in Winterfell it seemed. _The ramparts, the crypts, the keep, the yard, the great earthen ring that even now the giants push into place, block by block…_ Those not of the Neck soon learned the endurance of the crannogmen. They ate little and slept little, spending every waking moment fletching arrows for their funny little bows or else shoring up the castle’s defenses with every manner of ingenious (some said untoward) measure meant to foil or snare the enemy. Slowly getting up for a look out the window, Bran was unsurprised to see yet more snowfall. _Heady, too. The kind that comes to stay, that doesn’t melt at the first hint of sunrise._

He turned his back on the outside world and brought the fur blanket back up over Meera. She muttered uncertainly in her sleep. _You might find it heavy, but it will keep you warm, princess._ It had been a good while before she’d taken to blankets. When Bran asked incredulously if she had not had them in the Neck, she’d shaken her head.

“Fur, wool or cotton, any blanket would rot off your body or else fill with the eggs of creatures you’d not want on your skin.” Bran shuddered at the memory.

“Remind me to never _ever_ go to the Neck.” Truly, it was as if the crannogmen were a race unto themselves. _Short, slight, quiet. With big green eyes._ He couldn’t begin to count them so many had come to Winterfell, and even then, they all looked the same and sounded the same. _A tactic meant to unnerve, perhaps._ It had worked wonders on the Valemen, knights and lords both giving the smaller people a wide berth despite their harmless affect. Meera sat up in bed, her hair a long dark curtain tangled around her head.

“I ought have this cut…” she said.

“Don’t trouble yourself. You’re not like to get it caught on anything in Winterfell.” he said, finding himself fond of her black tresses.

“A wight can grab it, though.” _Ever the crannogwoman. If it cannot be used to your advantage, it will be used against you._

“Or Howland, when he gets a bit bigger.” Bran frowned. “Perhaps you might tie it back out there and let it down when we’re in here?” She smiled.

“As my prince wishes. But once the wights come in force, I’ll do as I please.”

“In the meantime, let your prince do as you please.”

“Well, I think breakfast might do me good.”

“I’ll go get it right away.” He moved for the door immediately but Meera stopped him.

“We could have it in the hall, perhaps.” she said, sounding shy. Bran grinned from ear to ear.

“Shall we bring him down, then?”

“I think it’s time. He may want to leave if the noise gets too loud, but he’s old enough to be seen at least.”

“Prince Howland Stark of Winterfell.” Bran said aloud. _I wonder what Father would have made of him. Of sharing a grandson with his most stalwart vassal._ He held Howland while Meera bathed and dressed, tapping his nose to make him huff in amusement, perhaps the beginnings of a laugh. Howland cooed in turn when presented with one of Meera’s fur slippers, grabbing at it enthusiastically whenever it was in sight. _Perhaps he can smell his mother on them. Or he just likes the feeling of fur._ His mind wandered to another Stark, one he’d looked the castle over for when Howland was first born. He’d found her in the crypts of all places, staring down a dark passage that according to her led to a hidden plain ringed in razor rock. Either out there, he supposed, or in the godswood by herself. _Sansa has become quite the recluse. I knew letting her wander beyond the Wall was a mistake. Maybe seeing Howland will set her to rights._ “I’ll meet you in the hall, Meera.” he told her when she had dressed, finally able to get into boots again with a giddy gasp. She took their son, Bran kissing his head and her cheek before they left.

“Be careful. She is your sister and mine and I’m sure she would never do us harm on purpose, but maybe Sansa is capable of more than what she knows.” Meera whispered.

He didn’t bother checking her room or the hall, where once it was the smart bet to find Sansa Stark trading courtesies with one lord or another. When she was not in the godswood either, Bran felt his heart sink. _I pray I don’t find her frozen to death from the inside in the crypts._ The vines and roots that had taken hold in the crypts near the Hungry Wolf had frosted over, the floor icy and slippery. On staring into the empty crypt, Bran could only gape in dismay. _He’s gone._ How the Singers had not realized at once was a puzzle he had to look to the vines around the crypt to piece together. _The Other saw the trap and tore its teeth out._ There was water on the floor of the crypt as well. _Washing away the dust that kept him flush to the far wall. Now he’s free to cause all the harm he can before we capture him again. Or kill him._ The crypt was cold, of course, but not the kind that seeped into the soul and ground the mind to a halt whenever an Other was near.

“Long gone, then…” he said aloud. _As is Sansa._ His tongue slid between his teeth. _Where could she be? Where could_ he _be?_ Bran found himself following the crypts, heading further into the darkness. _Toward the grotto._ He had not been back since they’d first found it. It was a place of wonder, no doubt, but it was also a place for the dead as much as the living. Given Howland’s birth, Bran felt his living family needed him more just now. The frost that formed on the stone would have shone mirror-bright had the Singers’ workings not been undone, but as it was the greenish-gold glow was quite absent leaving Bran to use the rats that skittered at his feet as guides. _Even then, they will only take me so far. Normal animals cannot abide the presence of an Other. Of winter given face, voice, form._ The rats stopped at the entrance to the grotto, the rune-covered arch a Wall in its own way. Bran spotted a white sliver slipping through the trees. He braced for the cold, that legendary cold, but no paralyzing wave was forthcoming. _Maybe the trees put a stop to it._ Leaf had said as much when the wights simply dropped on entry into the Raven’s cave. _The power that moves them is powerless here. Well, until I mucked_ that _up._ He moved as quietly as he could as quickly as he dared but nimble as Bran was he was certain his every step sounded like it was taken on mammoth feet to the cold one’s ears. “No dead down here to move, anyway. No dead kings for you.” Bran muttered under his breath. _Sansa had the right of it. Had we not scoured the crypts, the Other could have turned Winterfell into a crypt castle with just the kings newest dead._ The faces in the trees frowned out of their trunks impassively. _Annoyed, almost._ Bran knew better than anyone how set the trees were in their ways, how any deviation rankled them to their wooden cores. _So too with the old gods._ Perhaps it was simply part of being a tree. Though he was hardly surprised, Bran found his inability to catch up to the Other irritating. _Even crippled he is fleeter of foot than I._ He only caught up because his quarry had stopped moving, staring at the pact on the wall of the grotto. On reaching him Bran sucked in a breath. Fine white hair fell down to the Other’s shoulders and he was clad in icy armor, makeshift though it seemed. _Lighter than beyond the Wall. Perhaps one needs time and cold aplenty to fashion true plate-of-ice. Whoever you are, you’re no icesmith._ The flesh seared away by Meera’s smoky sword had not regrown, instead replaced once more by well-shaped ice. Bran had no doubt the Other knew he was there, but what threat could he pose? Why bother turning? “This is a Stark place. You’ve got no right to be here.” Bran tried to sound as Father had when he wore the face of Lord Stark, but his voice was high and chilled, echoing off the walls. _Bran the Boy, not Prince Brandon of Winterfell._ He swallowed. _No more._ When he spoke again, his voice did not waver and it echoed in tones of iron. This time the Other turned. Beauty had returned to his face, the skull beneath it no longer visible through the skin. What _was_ visible was the dark glassy scar beneath the armor where Meera had poked him with the dragonglass arrowhead. _I pray Jon brings back as much as he can._

He stood his ground, staring at the Other as his cold blue eyes took him in. The steel in his spine sparked a memory he thought forgotten. Once in another life he’d been paired against Prince Tommen in the training yard by Ser Rodrik Cassel. Tommen’s eyes were green though, his face round and red. After a bit of huffing and puffing Bran had knocked him to the ground, pulled more by the weight of his padding than pushed by any skill of Bran’s. _Meanwhile you could go through Ser Rodrick and all the rest without stopping for breath._ The Kingslayer was supposed to be a splendid knight, but steel shattered against razor ice no matter the gold spent on it, parted for a crystal sword heedless of the times it had been hammered.

“The things I do for love.” he said, choking up at the words. The Other’s remaining hand flexed and a sharpened icicle appeared as if from thin air. _Nothing comes from nothing, the Singers say. From the water in the air, or else left in him._ A moment later and its edge had spread until it was a sword for true. Past the Other the figures of grey and green stood frozen in the stone. I wonder if they ever got this close. He stopped not three feet away. Bran did not so much as shiver. “That’s how you lost before.” he said, pointing to the figures. “That’s how you’ll lose again.” For the first time Bran saw disdain creep into the Other’s face. Again, he was reminded of the Kingslayer. Where Jaime Lannister was hollow as a suit of armor though, the Other was full of dread purpose. Still, Bran saw the nose flare, the cold lips curl. _Not a word of the True Tongue and still I struck a nerve. No doubt he’ll understand this just as well._ He stuck his tongue out and crossed his eyes. “Mlhhh.” There was movement too fast to see, a noise like a tree crashing down. The Other was knocked off his feet, slung to the ground like a dog would a rat and there was a crunching, cracking sound as his armor shattered off his body. Bran blinked. _What just happened?_ For his part the Other stirred feebly on the grotto floor. _As if he’d run full sprint straight into a brick wall._ Footsteps behind him made Bran turn, still at a loss, only to see an obviously dead woman coming straight at him. He dove behind a tree but she made no move to pursue, instead pouncing on the Other and driving her elbow into his mouth. Another sound of ice cracking, freezing blood spattering the moss that covered the floor. Quite unceremoniously she stood, hoisting him under his arm before dragging him back off toward the grotto’s entrance. _Have I just been saved by a wight?_ Bran turned on legs that had turned to water, stumbling after her. Standing by the arch was another woman, someone straight out of one of Old Nan’s tales. In her grip was a walnut branch. A dozen black feathers dangled from the wood bound by red thread along with a white one from a bird far rarer, far fairer, than a common raven. _Yet the eyes are not an Other’s. Tully, even when the rest of her has turned to ice._ “Sansa?” he asked. Her hair was a mess of tangles and weir leaves, she smelled of pine and earth instead of sweetscent and yet the more he looked the more his sister shone through. _A Stark at last, if one less fit for the second Long Night than the first._ She seemed as like to speak as the wight. _The green-eyed wight._ Dimly he heard it dragging the Other up the steps. “We should make sure he can’t get out again.” he told her shakily. When she gave no answer again, he took her hand. _Forgive me, Sansa._ He reached for her and found only a tree-bending blizzard raging within. _Well, an Other may reach her but not me._ His effort made her blink in the waking world though, the unflinching stare melting into unsure glances around the grotto. Her perfect lips parted.

_“Bran.”_

“Sansa, are you hurt? Did they get in again? Did-”

“Bran, _I saw them._ I saw every one of them-”

“That is quite enough.”

Branch’s voice sounded angrier than Bran thought a Singer capable of being. Both he and Sansa turned toward Branch, the harmless-looking creature’s gentle hands balled into fists.

“Branch? What do you mean? What’s going on?” Bran asked. Branch ignored him utterly, which was very much a first.

“You are perilously close to going down a road that can only harm, Princess.” Sansa gulped.

“I didn’t mean any harm-”

“A hurricane does not mean to sink ships by the dozen and drown sailors by the hundred. A blizzard does not aim to scour a fallow field of crops or freeze men where they stand.” Bran frowned.

“You speak as though my sister were a child playing with a crossbow.”

“Wiser minds than she have tried to make themselves master of forces that will not be ruled.”

“I didn’t try to master anything.” Sansa said, her voice hardening. “I was sick of waiting around for someone else to handle my problems for me. Maybe if your ways, so sacred, worked in the first place, you wouldn’t be huddled in the dark with a pair of orphans trying to figure out how to put an end to the Others’ schemes.” Branch blinked, as did Bran. “We tried it your way the first time. At best, we can only hope to force them away and forget they ever existed.”

“There _is_ no other way.”

“That doesn’t make sense. Winter is part of the world, as much so as the other seasons. Your kind exist for a reason, surely, as do men. So, too, must the Others. _Why,_ I cannot fathom-”

“I already explained. They are winter’s will embodied. They seek to scour all life within reach, because that is what winter does.”

“Winter is sleep, not death. The world goes to sleep and yes, the sun is further and dimmer and yes, life is harder, but not so much for creatures borne of cold. Others and ice spiders, they are alive as we are. Life does not seek to destroy itself out of hand. Why would it?” Branch could not seem to comprehend her words, lost for his own. _He cannot think outside the roots, the trees. The past,_ Bran thought. _At least Sansa’s trying something different. Maybe she got lost in some briars, got a little muddied, but she seems alright now._ Branch for his part seemed ready to cry. “Easy enough to hide behind the old conflict. It’s something else about the Others. Something that rankles you to your core. The other Singers, too.” Bran reached for the Singer’s three-fingered hand and for the first time he saw one flinch.

“You are one for stories, Brandon Stark. There is one told among your kind, about the Night’s King.” Bran frowned. “Not the miscreation of our own doing. The thirteenth man to hold the Wall.”

“How would you know about the history of the Night’s Watch?”

“Let him speak, Bran.” Sansa said, soft and ready to listen. _Like Mother._

“Before men forgot the threat of winter and the ones who brought it, we gave them that which you call dragonglass often and generously. There were no secrets between the Watchers on the Wall and Those Who Sing the Song of Earth.” His lip quivered and curled. “Until _he_ came.” He was silent for a long time. _To speak of him is pain,_ Bran thought.

“Old Nan used to tell me stories about him. How atop the Wall one night, he saw a woman wandering in the Haunted Forest. A woman with cold white skin and eyes like blue stars. A corpse queen, as Old Nan put it.” Sansa’s own blues widened. “Well, you get the picture.” Bran said, less to spare Sansa than Branch.

“What became of her, when he was overthrown?”

“She disappeared. There was no trace when the northmen scoured the Nightfort-”

“She was no more corpse than the Watcher she wooed.” Branch said as quietly as he could, it sounded to Bran. _He is beyond pained, he is hurt hollow._ “No part of her was any less alive than the men who forced her to flee back to her kind. When men arrived, there was discord. After that brief strife though…you cannot know how glorious it was. We were close to the giants, _are_ close to the giants, but…”

“They’re giants.” Sansa said rather bluntly. “They go their own way.” Branch nodded.

“Men were our great trial and our great triumph. Men helped us to cast them out, back into their blighted emptiness even as they raised the dead among them as their chattel.” _Is that what all this is about?_

“Branch, wights are dead things. That the Others can raise dead people to fight for them, that isn’t a failing of the Singers. That isn’t us being closer to them than you, choosing to be with them over you...” Branch’s forehead creased and he shook his head. Bran was reminded vividly of his father-by-law. _What can cause such lasting pain? A wound in the spirit, not in the flesh. One that never heals._

“It was not the first time. The first time one among your kind…but it was the last.” Branch nodded. “The gods watched, and we saw to it that it was the last.”

“Take an Other to wife, you mean?” Bran asked, so confused, while Branch gasped as if stabbed.

“Winter roses are not our doing, nor of our making, Brandon Stark. _They_ brought them south into green lands when the Long Night fell. The Ones That Walk With Winter…what they have, what we lack…” He was doubled over, unable even to weep. “The next time you find yourself among them, Sansa Stark, look a little closer. You may then see what so draws our ire.” he said, before turning and staggering away.

Bran made to follow, mind reeling, but Sansa slipped an arm in his and held him fast.

“Let him go, Bran.” she said.

“I don’t understand-”

“Neither do I. I haven’t the faintest idea. But he is far too upset to go prying further into matters his kind clearly would like buried forever. I need you to be my lookout anyway, so I can get back to my room and bathe before I go showing you, your princess and your new prince off to the rest of Winterfell.”

“Er, what about that?” Bran asked, pointing to the length of walnut. “Who’s-”

“Ramsay Snow’s. It was his dying desire to be part of me, as he put it. I suppose he thought I might have been with his get, and that I’d not have it in me to drink a barrel’s worth of moon tea to put it off. To my very great relief, I felt no sickness nor aches and no cravings were forthcoming. I needed brew no tea. After my last jaunt across the Wall, I returned…in rather a wild mood. I may have scared the wits out of poor Brienne, I ought to apologize…”

“Sansa, you have a wight of your own dragging our friend back to his cell. That may require _some_ explanation.”

“Not if people don’t see her. She can stay there, dragonglass in hand, a tireless ever-watchful sentry while the Singers go about repairing the cell and getting on with doing whatever else they need to do. Gods know it will be more she’s done for others than anything she did in life.” Sansa said dryly. “Go ready Howland for a bit of showing-off. Meera needs you just now, not me.” Bran swallowed. _She isn’t incoherent, or cold, or Other-eyed. I think she’ll be alright._ He nodded, squeezing her hand before he left her for the surface. _I suppose after the Raven’s hole, I’m done with being put off by tight dark spaces._ He didn’t recognize the guardsmen on duty, two hairless chins of an age with him. They nodded nervously, one after the other. _Boys, worried about chasing girls or getting drunk once their relief appears. That was never me._

“Just see that nobody goes down there. The Singers- er, the Children of the Forest like dark and quiet, not a gaggle of children chasing each other around.”

“Yes, my prince.” they replied in unison. _At least we recaptured the Other before he could cause any harm._ Bran thanked the gods for that much. On reaching their room he slipped inside quietly, closing the door behind him.

“It would be easier on you if I came in through the window. Quieter, I wouldn’t wake him on you.”

“Easier, too, for you to slip and fall. Only instead of to the floor, you’d fall what, thirty feet?” Meera replied, gently rocking Howland as he fed. It was an idyllic scene, one Bran hated to ruin, but he brought her current with the goings on in the grotto anyway. Her lips tightened but she didn’t stop her slow, rhythmic movement and the babe kept on his quiet course. “Did you expect him to stay bundled up until the king returned? I’m only surprised it took him this long to get out.”

“But Sansa-”

“Sansa wanted to find out for herself what she is worth. For all we know the Other thinks she was playing with him, the cat letting the mouse go only to catch it again.” Howland gave a hiccup and Meera patted his back.

“Here, I’ll hold him while you change. I know you aren’t proud-”

“Proud enough not to go before the lords in a nightgown with a babe at the breast, Bran!” Meera said, cheeks turning rose as she found a clean jerkin and leggings. _Green and brown and grey, ever were they hers to wear._

To Bran’s relief the hall neither cheered nor rushed Meera to get a glimpse of the bundle in her arms. There were raised mugs and tankards, more than Bran could count as well as countless calls of congratulations and a few for someone to pay up, sparking laughter in the hall. _Not much else to do but build whatever pops into Lord Howland’s head or bet on our babe’s gender, I suppose._ He was absent as he almost always was, here and there and everywhere about Winterfell. Atop it, below it, sealing every crack and slowly but steadily putting the pieces together. _A southern lord commander would remain in the keep and direct the defenses from a fireside chair._ Not that the little man’s approach was decried by anyone. If anything, their guests found the vigor of Howland Reed and his countrymen nothing short of astonishing. Bran pulled a chair out for Meera on the high table, slipping a blanket around her shoulders to keep her warm. He saw Lord Arryn shoot the table a few glances. _Probably looking for Sansa. Poor Lord Royce. While he waits for his liege lord to ask Sansa for her hand, I can imagine a scarce few people less fit to one another._ Then he thought about it again. Perhaps he was being unfair to the Lord of the Eyrie. He wasn’t so stiff in his ways or thinking as were many lords his elder and indeed had only been civil to the peoples from beyond the Wall when they felt the urge to join the goings-on in the hall. Sansa was just as possessed of a wildness as Jon, if one eminently more dangerous and unpredictable. _Storms are dangerous and unpredictable. That doesn’t make them bad._ Again, Bran found himself reconsidering. Liberal as Harrold Arryn was, Bran could not picture him taking Sansa’s new friend or games of come-into-my-body with something beyond the Wall in stride. As breakfast wore on the hall slowly filled, mostly with northmen and valemen. Some of the more known wildlings were sat around the leftmost table, closer to where the king would sit than the door. _Once Jon returns, he’s like to do things in the godswood where the wildlings are more comfortable. The giants, too._ Maybe the Singers would see fit to join in turn. _Or maybe they’ll stay beneath the earth and dismay of things that happened before their own lifetimes._ Maybe it had to do with all the change happening of late. _They don’t do well with quickly adjusting course. Like the Others, I imagine. Wood or ice, once on a path they stay on until they fall._ Not that he’d ever suggest such to a Singer, even one less resolute (if one existed) than Branch. Bemoaning men’s impermanence just then seemed to Bran rather foolish. _At least we’re not afraid to go our own way. We may not be so able as the Dawn Races, but our paths are ours to choose._

When Sansa joined them, she wore a spotless ivory gown shot through with grey silk at the wrists and hem. No few heads turned, though whether that was due to her or the walnut stick she held Bran could only guess. Behind her as ever came the pack of hounds, the big black one laying beneath the table at her feet. _Oh,_ now _the wildlings feel welcome,_ Bran thought, rolling his eyes. _Top a stick with a skull and all of a sudden, you’re worth looking at twice. It may keep marriage offers from high lords away but who can say what is proper in the wild?_ Sansa paid the murmurs no mind, didn’t even look up from her plate but Bran saw the look on Harrold Arryn’s face. _Not fear, as with the Waynwoods._ _Not mirth, as with the wildlings. Something in between. Perhaps he knows more of Sansa’s time in Bolton hands than I realized. Small wonder, then, he took such joy in watching the giants smash their cavalry aside, watching Jon smash the Bastard of the Dreadfort’s teeth in._ If only the other lords saw it quite that way. The time for courtly courtesies would end with the coming of the Others, Bran knew. Manners and homage would not send them packing back to the Land of Always Winter. The snows fell every day as well, keeping the walkways in the castle clear had become a chore without end. _I hope Jon comes back soon,_ he thought, feeling small. _I may be Prince of Winterfell but I wouldn’t last long if Tommen’s wight attacked me in the yard._ _Nor can I lead half so well as Jon._ His melancholy didn’t go unnoticed, Meera sliding her hand into his and squeezing. _Nor soothe half so well as Meera._ House Stark fell from focus when the next course arrived, free food and ale bringing the conversation a bit louder as the hall’s occupants fell to talking among themselves.

“Can we bring him outside? I would think it’s too cold for a babe…” he wondered.

“Too cold is a matter of perspective, Bran. We’ve borne cold worse than this.” Meera replied. Bran shivered at the memory. Meera dragging him through a blizzard. _Hold the door. How strange that the last command Hodor obeyed, after years of serving House Stark, would be Meera’s. Maybe he knew a Stark when he heard one, even unto death._

Despite her bold words, Meera held Howland close as they moved out onto the ramparts. His burbling earned him a kiss on the head. Not to be outdone, Bran honored him as well making her laugh.

“I suppose you’re right. He is no stranger to cold, to snow. I wonder if he had to contend with it in the womb.”

“Who can say what happens before we come into this world, Bran?” Meera replied, feeding Howland beneath her heavy blanket. The approach of one of the giants from the wolfswood drew several cries from the sentries.

“My prince-”

“A giant is approaching. They’re rather hard to miss. Still, at least you didn’t simply wet yourself. Next time just make one of us aware. Giants don’t much like our ballyhooing whenever they turn up.”

“Yes, my prince.” When the giant reached the wall of Winterfell, he was red-faced from running and needed a moment to take several massive breaths. Then he began to speak excitedly, his elated voice making Bran’s bones rattle. He saw Howland’s grey eyes pop open wide, looking around warily while the giant talked. _The Old Tongue,_ Bran thought, understanding maybe a word in ten. The guard ran off and returned with a grumbling older woman from among the wildlings whose sour mood vanished on sight of their visitor. A few exchanges in the Old Tongue later and she was grinning wide as the giant.

“He says Moga had her baby. A girl, the other giants are fairly excited. I guess they haven’t had a wee one come along for a bit.” Bran felt a smile creep across his own face.

“Tell him she has our congratulations. We had a babe come along recently as well, the world has yet to grow sick of us. Despite what the Others may think.” The woman relayed his words, the giant snickering (a truly odd sight to Bran) before he moved off, back toward the wolfswood.

“Well, that should please Jon mightily. A new giant rising is just the kind of news he’ll be looking for on his return.” Sansa said from behind them.

“You made quite the impression today. Both with your gown and your stick.” Bran told her.

“If someone is curious, they may ask me.” she replied, shrugging.

“And if Jon asks?” That shook Sansa, so much that her lip quivered.

“I will tell him the truth. At the least I can be of more use than some firedancer who can’t tell future apart from flames.” She pulled a face much like Arya used to and Bran found himself laughing. _There is room for all at Winterfell, even in the cells for the Other, but none for the followers of the red god from the east. As if the Singers needed something more to be upset about._

Bran closed the door behind them when he returned to their room, eager to let Howland get some sleep.

“I thought we’d get a visit from my mother today.” Meera said, looking worried.

“She must be with your father, then. I’m sure she’s fine.”

“I would have asked a few people, but it’s not exactly like they can tell the crannogmen apart from one another.” _Well, you aside, sweetling._

“Shall we pay her a visit, then? Howland doesn’t seem in the mood for a nap anyway.” Bran said, running a finger down the babe’s cheek. Again, the grey eyes popped open, slowly looking around in front of him. _Hello, there._ Howland stared out from his bundle, taking in Bran’s face. “Alright, let’s go. Surely she has time to dote on her grandson.” He made for the window without thinking, promptly going red at Meera’s expression. Then she was laughing, tears in her eyes. “Well, it’s easier to get there by climbing!” Bran replied defensively, trying not to fall in love with her all over again.

“Not with a babe in arms. We’ll walk, unless you don’t know how to get there going hall to hall?” she teased. Bran led her to her parents’ room without another word, ignoring the hot feeling in his face. Several crannogmen were posted in front of their door, idly peering about without saying so much as a word to each other. Meera’s smile returned and she made a sound, one that made them all jump and look to her immediately.

“What was that?” Bran asked, startled by their uniform reaction. She made the sound again, Howland looking up.

“It’s the sound of newly-hatched lizard-lions, calling to their mother.” She made it again. _“Awp!”_ The other crannogmen (and women, Bran saw) looked on fascinatedly. “I used to be able to get them to come out of their eggs when the time came. They would hear me and spring out, crying for food.”

“You and no other, princess.” one of the women said.

“Lady Fenn.” Meera replied. “Bran, this is Syra Fenn, Lady of Wyrelake.” _Another ladyling from the Neck,_ Bran thought excitedly. She looked perhaps of an age with Meera, though it was truly hellish hard to tell for certain. That his princess came form the same bogs and quags as her fellows never ceased to astonish him. _She favors her mother,_ he thought, _if not by much._ Again, she made the sound and it snapped Bran out of his reverie. To his astonishment, Howland reciprocated with an odd little squeaking of his own.

“Lady Reed is asleep just now, princess. She took mildly ill after the babe came, perhaps a touch of exhaustion, but she should be fine.” Meera looked confused.

“Ill?”

“We thought it odd too, princess, but they were your father’s words. We are no longer in the land of our ancestors, perhaps only there are we proofed from sickness. Once he is certain Lady Jyana has regained her strength I’m certain she will rejoin the rest of us.” The journey back to their room had Meera almost in tears.

“Has your mother been ill before?”

“Never. It’s the first I’ve ever heard of one of us taking ill, save when Jojen nearly died as a child. She can’t have got greywater fever in _Winterfell,_ though.”

“Lady Fenn suspected it was just exhaustion. I’d be under the weather too if I were on my knees ready to catch my grandson for who knows how long.”

He stood in the midst of a massive blizzard, a storm the like of which he’d never seen even in the glimpses he’d gotten of the Dawn Age when he was with the Three-Eyed Raven. _Winter, and with a vengeance._ Looking around, he saw trees, hills, and countless wights walking slowly but implacably onward, even rising to walk again when the winds knocked them off their dead feet or tossed them about like so many leaves. _But who am I, who can stand in the midst of the Army of the Dead unbothered? It feels like Summer, but Summer died with Leaf and the Raven._ He followed the countless dead, the huge shadows of wight-giants plodding here and there. Given the viciousness of the blizzard and the severity of the snow, it was some time before he realized just where he was. _I know this place,_ he thought with a growing dread. In the distance he spotted the glint of gold atop a high far tower. _Queenscrown, a hundred miles south of the Wall. No need for a raven this time, either. They must be about to sound the horn._ A sharp cry woke him at once, so suddenly he gurgled unintelligibly and took a full minute to become sensate. Another sound, of fist on wood. Looking outside Bran saw only darkness, the moon absent. _What can it be at this time of night?_ The noise prompted fussing and burbling from Howland while Meera, already awake, sought to soothe him.

“Something’s happening, Bran. I can hear guards running on the ramparts from our window.” she said tersely. He dressed as fast as he could while answering the door, finding himself face to face with the sentry from that morning looking similarly disheveled.

“We’re getting members of the Night’s Watch, my prince. Coming from the Wall. I…you’d best come along, my prince.” he said. Bran made to close the door but Meera had come up right behind him.

“Aren’t you tired?” he asked her.

“I was tired the night I pulled you from the cave. Better tired than dead.” she replied, bringing Howland with her.  
They were the last ones in the hall, northmen and Vale knights and wildling chieftains all present while Howland Reed took the account of the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch.

“We were atop the wall when they came in force. Them, their dead, and gods only know what else crashing through the trees. There were cold giants too, they had a massive horn that took a tempest to awaken. One of them sounded it and lightning began to hit the Wall.” he gulped. “Forget the Horn, I thought the ice beneath me would give from that alone. We took the lift down fast as we dared and just started running. I didn’t stop for anything, not even to see the Wall come down. What daylight hours we were spared were spent on sleep only to run like dogs when daylight went. Two days, three, I can’t remember.” They had come from a dozen different places, a dozen different peoples, but to a one Bran saw the same expression on each of their faces. Lord Royce’s mouth moved for a full minute before he realized he wasn’t speaking.

“I don’t understand, my lord. Are you saying Castle Black has fallen?”

“I’m saying Castle Black is _gone._ Gone with all the other castles. Not the Wall, though. One of them shaped the pieces into snow as they fell and sent the mother of all blizzards south after us as we ran. Any of the lads who couldn’t keep moving got swept up in the wall of white. I expect they’re right back to it, on their way here now.” Immediately Howland Reed began to speak, so fast Bran had trouble hearing.

“Assemble my lords, and in force. All your power, all your men. It seems the Others wish to pay us a visit. Let us be courteous hosts and greet them.” Then he moved from the hall, leaving his peers in stunned silence.

“What he said.” Frygga, the chieftain of the Ice-Wives said, and they went about it, rushing to and fro to wake the castle.


	2. Missandei I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Missandei takes her leave of the Sand Snakes.

Despite the sun on the banners that flew from every spire and tower, Missandei found herself rising before the selfsame sigil nearly every day. _As it was in Essos,_ she thought. The Dornish were not unpleasant, exactly, but they were deeply proud in a way that mirrored the nobility of Slaver’s Bay entirely too much for her liking. _Thin skin and hot blood make for poor neighbors and poorer lovers._ When word that she was Daenerys Targaryen’s emissary got around the court, she heard little else than the same half-dozen stories of various Dornishmen repelling the Iron Throne’s efforts to conquer them. _The death of Rhaenys. Daeron, the Young Dragon. Aegon the Unworthy and his puppet-dragons. Lord Tyrell and the scorpions._ Only a few had made the key realization that Missandei, and by extension, the queen, had nothing further from her mind than attempting a military conquest of Dorne. In a similar vein, Torgo Nudho got no shortage of dirty looks. Their hosts’ first impression, no doubt, was a foreign soldier seasoned from campaigns across the water. In time, though, they began to see him as simply part of Missandei. A stateless bodyguard instead of an occupying presence. _One who could not care less whether a dragon banner is ever flown from the Tower of the Sun._ As it stood, the woman Ellaria Sand less ruled Dorne than led a household that happened to be the seat of House Martell. _Never mind that the last Martells were killed by her and her daughters._ That was no business of Missandei’s, though, she was there only to warm the Dornish to the queen. _At least I put them out of sorts. No doubt they were expecting someone altogether more martial. Perhaps a Dothraki, or even a Westerosi from outside Dorne._ It only showed the Dornish mindset, that looking to take offense at any slight intended or otherwise. _The child who sticks his hand in thorns just to brag he’s bled._ Such smallness as it was made Missandei sad. They did not enslave the commons below them and rarely bothered with affairs outside their borders, but the world was much larger than Dorne. Her eyes found Ellaria again, flirting with a woman wearing a purple sash dotted by little golden beads. Again, Missandei was reminded of the frills of the Masters’ tokars. _Silver, gold, pearl. There are masters the world over._ The other women were either slowly getting more incensed, in Obara’s case, at the pretentions of a man with an opal in his ear shaped like a perched vulture or batting her eyes at Torgo Nudho in Nymeria’s. Tyene, the only daughter of Ellaria’s body at court as far as Missandei understood, was absent. _Sand, they call themselves, but those who live in Sunspear’s shade and relax in the Water Gardens have no business living in a desert._

She excused herself, taking to wandering Sunspear’s halls. The guards were no Unsullied, coupling in dark corners or else playing _cyvasse,_ looking bored. _Guarding what, exactly? And whom?_ Nobody paid her any mind, not the dragon queen’s harmless Sothoryi pet, so Missandei went back to her room to wait for Torgo Nudho. _If he can work himself free of Nymeria Sand without giving offense._ Missandei had wanted to prompt him to come herself but she didn’t want to get a wry response from the Sand Snake. _Better to let him come when he can._ Her room wasn’t particularly finely furnished, if anything it appeared as though it had been almost looted when she first arrived at Sunspear. Her rooms at the Water Gardens had been the same way. _Perhaps someone the Dornish were keen to forget occupied the space I do now._ Missandei shivered, from unpleasant thoughts and the night air both. It was certainly warmer than Dragonstone had been, but even Sunspear had been subject to nights no Dornishperson had fit clothing for. _There’s nothing in Dorne that offers fur worth wearing, either,_ she thought. _There is nowhere to hide from the wind outside city and castle walls. If winter reaches Dorne in earnest, there will be a real problem keeping warm._ A peek out the window compounded her concern, watching people in the city streets below scurry from alley to alley. _I wonder how proud the commons are to be Dornishmen alike with people like Ellaria Sand._ _A dead prince’s paramour and milking it for all it’s worth, and the Dornish lords all but let her. For now._ She blinked in surprise when her eyes trailed downward to the sandstone outcropping directly below. A wilted orchid sat on a small piece of parchment folded neatly in the shape of a lion, nestled in a cranny to protect it from the wind. _Impossible to spot unless one looked directly down from this particular window._ A rush of excitement flushed though her despite her reserved nature and she somewhat sheepishly looked around to make sure no one was watching. Despite her best efforts a sudden cold gust blew the orchid off the paper lion, the dead flower sweeping off to the docks and the Summer Sea beyond. The sight captivated her until the orchid finally vanished into the night. _At least I got the lion…_ she mused as she straightened up. To her astonishment she could see lines of ink through the lion’s paper flesh and straightaway she got to unfolding it, tongue between her teeth so as not to tear it. The craftsmanship astonished her, as did the lion itself. Tyrion Lannister had made no little mention of the enmity between the Martells and the Dornishmen behind them and the Lannisters of Casterly Rock, yet here was a lion tucked away just below one of Sunspear’s windows! _The room’s previous occupant?_ No wonder the room looked as it did. _Who would the Lannisters be so foolish as to send into the arms of an enemy? An unwanted family member?_ Missandei frowned, already not possessed of the regard Westerosi had for the lions of the westerlands. Finally, the paper lion came unfolded and Missandei sat on her bed, taking in the words before her.

_I can be certain that whoever finds this will be no Dornishperson. Much as I love my future people, they have a certain senselessness that leaves them blind and deaf to all save what fits them in the moment. Perhaps that’s what has wedded them so to vengeance against any slight, real or perceived. I am always hopeful that my presence here and eventual marriage to Trystane will help turn a page, but I am not so naïve as to be heedless of the danger around me- particularly after Prince Oberyn’s death. Should I die in Dorne, I would like whoever finds this to tell Prince Trystane I will love him always, to tell King Tommen I am ever his devoted servant, and to tell Ser Jaime Lannister I only wish I knew him better._

_-Done in the hand of Princess Myrcella Baratheon_

Missandei stared at the paper until her eyes hurt. They roved over the graceful letters, over the name. _A name I know,_ she thought. _I heard it back on Dragonstone._ _‘For Myrcella,’_ the crippled knight had said. Tyrion had been greatly saddened by news of her death as well. _I suppose she was right to hide a testament somewhere._ Obviously the Lannister brothers held Ellaria Sand to blame for the girl’s untimely death, but had the princess herself seen it coming? _Yet while Sand feasts and beds and acts so carelessly, a girl years dead is more alive than she. Often are the gentle and mild mistaken for unable, for unknowing._ Carefully Missandei folded the parchment up, tucking it in the sole of her shoe. Dornish clothing left no other place to put it! She went back out into the hall amid thoughts each more troubling than the last.

“I didn’t take you for a wanderer.” An amiable voice called from further down the hall. _Amity to hide the poison. She must not know any Naathi._ Already weary of her new companion, Missandei turned to see Tyene Sand striding toward her.

“Hello, Tyene.” she said.

“Shouldn’t you be fending off Nymeria’s attempts to steal your Summer Islander?”

“Torgo Nudho is not a Summer Islander. He considers himself Unsullied.”

“And Nym considers herself Dornish. She’s as much YiTish, though. Did you know that?”

“I thought it possible. Once in a great while, YiTish merchants paid the House of Nakloz visits to dispute with them over trade tariffs. They were not fond of the Ghiscari claiming to precede them to the written word.” Missandei let a small smile form in the corner of her mouth. “Nor were they very amenable to the practice of slavery. One night, Master Kraznys got drunker than usual and inquired as to the price of a Lengii woman.” Tyene Sand whistled.

“I bet the YiTish loved that.”

“They stood to a one and left immediately, taking everything they’d brought with them. Saffron, jade…overnight their prices tripled. They tripled again when it became quite clear that the YiTish would not be returning under any circumstances. When it came out that Kraznys mo Nakloz was to blame for so offending Astapor’s only source of precious stone and spices, the other Good Masters all but cut his house out of ruling the city.”

“Nymeria acts the mysterious beauty when trying to catch a Dornishman, whispering all manner of nonsense in his ear about her mother’s homeland. About the only bit I ever believed was how fond the YiTish are of the Lengii.”

“That much was true. Once they were great enemies, or so the histories say, but now YiTish fleets patrol the waters around Leng without pause, hunting corsairs and slavers alike with unerring accuracy and astonishing ferocity. More than once I’ve heard the rumor that the YiTish patrols are guided somehow to those ships unwelcome in Lengii waters.”

“Or, the YiTish know the waters well, better than any intruder.” Tyene replied. Missandei shrugged.

“I’ve never been that far east; I can only say what I’ve heard.”

“Do you know what I’ve heard? That Nymeria stopped in Naath while the Rhoynar were looking for a new homeland. It may be there is a drop or two -or three- of Rhoynish blood in common between you and House Martell.” The idea was remarkably distasteful to Missandei. _Yet an expression of inclusion. Yet again, given by a shameless snake._

On her return to the hall Missandei saw Torgo Nudho’s face relax perceptibly, if only to her. He stood abruptly, cutting Nymeria Sand off before he made his way to Missandei, passing behind the columns rather than marching through the reveling Dornishmen.

“He looks as pleased to be here as you do.” Tyene said wryly. A sound hit her ears then, one that drowned all else out. Missandei slowly turned her head away from Tyene Sand, mouth half-open. The Sand Snake and even Torgo Nudho were forgotten as Missandei again left the feast hall, finding herself on a balcony and staring at something truly unforgettable. The owl was white as a full moon, whiter, with blue eyes that pierced right through her. It hooted. _That’s no native bird._ Tyene’s approaching laughter behind Missandei did not get so much as a blink from the animal. The sound died abruptly when Tyene joined her on the balcony, watching the owl stare at them from its perch on a banner pole. Again, it hooted. Whether by chance or something else, white flurries began to feather down from the sky. The day’s fading light made for a truly spectacular view, even as Missandei got a sharp shock from feeling the bits of white, pure cold, hit her skin. Her heart sank, a nameless dread forming in the pit of her stomach. _Something is about to happen,_ she thought. _Something Dorne could not be less ready for._ Slowly, she reached the balcony’s railing and peered down into the darkness, the streets far below hidden by the gathering dark of night. There was nothing to see.

“Missandei.” Torgo Nudho called, his voice a steady base for her heart to beat to. She felt his hand take hers, unexpectedly forward from a man who stepped carefully around her. The owl gave a last hoot and soared off toward the ports. Missandei swallowed. _It’s happening now. Right now, and I can only brace for it._

“We need to go,” she said. “We need to go someplace safe.” “The Tower of the Sun is the safest place in Dorne.” Tyene said, though she sounded unconvinced. Missandei paid her not the least bit of mind. “Torgo Nudho, you must wake the palace guards. We are under attack.” she said, certain of it as she was uncertain of their enemy. His stony gaze did not reflect alarm, but she knew he trusted her, even more so when it came to danger.

“Then we will go to a place of safety, Missandei of Naath. Perhaps it is time we returned to the Queen. You’ve spoken your piece to everyone of importance in this land called Dorne, we are of no more use to her here.” he said firmly, glad to be quit of cunning Snakes and proud Dornishmen. Missandei had a sentiment of agreement on the tip of her tongue when her every instinct told her to go back to the railing, to check again and make certain there was nothing there. She took a deep breath and pulled from Torgo Nudho, rushing to the railing and looking down bold as any Sand Snake.

The face that stared back was not a foot away. Eight huge blue eyes reflected her face better than any mirror. Two enormous fangs were frozen in a predatory grimace, the frontmost pair of legs raised alike, ready to pounce. Then the fangs clicked. Just as the face began to grow closer, she spotted Torgo Nudho’s arm shoot out from the right, a purple blur fast in his grip. He buried in the creature’s face soaking Missandei’s fingers and front in frigid blood. A sound unlike any she’d ever heard, a high piercing hell-screech, filled the night. The creature wrenched itself free from the weapon and Missandei saw its eight-limbed body fall out of sight. _Two. Five. Ten. Thirty,_ she counted uncomprehendingly as more of the same crept nimbly up the sandstone. On spotting her the lead creature gave a shriek, its fellows rushing on so much like a wolf pack.

 _“Run!”_ Torgo Nudho bellowed, pulling Missandei from the balcony. Her Naathi sense of calm, a boon in Daznak’s pit, was no help now. The eyes, the fangs, the legs had done what no number of Sons of the Harpy could do, not truly. Echoing hoots and cries in answer from over the railing only spurred her on, until she was outstripping Torgo Nudho and Tyene Sand both. _Get away,_ her instincts screamed. _Get away from this place, get away from_ them. She dashed blindly past a swaying guard who smelled of red wine and burst into the hall, the faces a mixture of alarmed and confused. _They cannot have missed the noise. Tell them,_ she screamed at herself. Nothing passed her lips but air. Instead another sound filled the room, one as like and yet maddeningly unlike the screeches as could be imagined. _Like cracking stone, like cracking bone. But different._ It was loud, unafraid, uncaring who heard. _They no longer need the element of surprise._ The sounds of battle joined below them and in the streets besides, the quiet night exploding into shouts, then into screams. It sounded like an entire host had stormed the city. The Tower of the Sun’s occupants began pulling daggers out of waistbands and boots. _Does it sound like we’re being attacked by a typical army? There are no shouts of anger or commands. I hear nothing but dying Dornishmen. Fatted caterpillars munching mindlessly on the branch, heedless of the web woven around them._ She heard countless feet quickly ascending the various staircases, heard the other two finally catch up. “Mama! We have to go!” Ellaria looked stunned at her daughter’s antics.

“What-”

 _“Spiders! The size of hounds, the size of horses!”_ More screeching, a sort of piping hooting as they made their way up the tower’s outside.

“Is there another way out of here? One inaccessible from the streets?” Missandei asked quickly.

“The only one we can reach from here is in the throne room.” Nymeria Sand said, stretching out her whip.  
“You can run. I’m not about to let the blood in Father’s veins be chased out of Sunspear.” Obara Sand said in turn, what few guards sober enough to stand gathering unsteadily at her side.

“Then stay and die.” Missandei said, taking Torgo Nudho’s hand and heading for the throne room.

The sight of the twin thrones, spear and sun, did little to inspire the Dornish. Immediately Nymeria dashed to one of the tapestries that hung innocuously next to a round window, pulling it aside and elbowing the bricks behind it to reveal a space between the throne room and the outer wall.

“It’s not meant for a whole crowd at once…” she said, as if in realization.

“Go, then, Mama. Take the court, we will follow after.” Tyene said.

“Not until all the rest have gone before. To do any less would shame your father’s name.” Ellaria replied, voice steely. Torgo Nudho had to give more than one sharp shove to get everyone down the hollow passage but to Missandei’s surprise the throne room actually began to empty.

“Where does this lead?” she asked while the herding continued.

“A hidden harbor, out away from the city proper. There is always a ship there, of sound make and loyal crew, ready to take the fleeing Martells wherever they wish to go.” _There are no more Martells,_ Missandei thought. _You killed the last._ The last few Dornish lords disappeared into the wall. Out of the corner of her eye Missandei saw Ellaria Sand kiss her daughter on the forehead before sending her through the passage with Nymeria. Battle joined in the feast hall below, ending as quickly as it had begun. The hunt-packs had begun to climb the dome, evidently heedless of its smooth surface. Time is short and growing shorter. Her fear began to subside, the Naathi calm rising over it like the tide coming in over a sunken ship. Missandei took Torgo Nudho’s hand.

“I suppose it will be war, then.” she said, choosing her words carefully.

“War, once we reach the Queen. She will force away the darkness that has come to grip this place.” He nodded.

“No Naathi has ever won a war, Torgo Nudho.” He frowned.

“I do not understand, Missandei of Naath.”

“I can be of no further use, no further benefit to the Queen. Translators do no good in wars against enemies that speak no known tongue. I have no purpose, Torgo Nudho, no reason to reach her. You do.” He got her meaning then.

“I would be a better soldier, Missandei of Naath, if I knew I had you to fight for.” “You are the commander of the queen’s Unsullied, her finest troops. There are no other Torgo Nudhos.” She felt tears rise, trickling down her cheeks.

“She will find other Missandeis of Naath.” He might have been a statue.

“I won’t.” he said finally. “Even if there are, I do not wish to look for them.” His hands closed around hers, polished flat of calluses from years of holding a spear.

“Go. Every second is one fewer you have to put between yourself and the enemy.” she told him. He quickly slipped an arm around her waist and brought his lips to hers. _A knife can cut away only flesh._ Then he was gone, disappearing into the gap as she’d instructed him. Then the bricks came together again, and the tapestry fell in front of it. Nothing more did Missandei want than to see the face of the man who had only seconds ago held her.

While Ellaria Sand started and gasped at the sounds of approaching footsteps, Missandei only closed her hands in front of her as if she stood next to the Queen in the Great Pyramid of Meereen. Chittering noises and the sounds of cracking sandstone were followed by great tumbling slabs, smashing into pieces against the marble floor. Missandei did not move, even as the great pale bodies began to pour through the holes in the dome, massing in its underside. She could hear Sand shuddering from revulsion, shivering from cold. _Some are not so large as others. The smaller ones dart about so, the larger make no such haste,_ she thought detachedly. The doors, barred as they were, shook with the force put upon them until they simply flew off their frame. They slammed to the floor looking so much like a table-top, while several creatures even stooping stood taller than men trudged into the throne room. They bore greatclubs hewn from ice and wore strange white pelts Missandei did not recognize. They paid the pair no mind, looking around with sharp blue eyes, long noses sniffing warily. Their flesh was blue as well, the weak blue of a morning sky gone to cloud. One of them wore silvered splint, cracking its jaw at the sight of Missandei of Naath and Ellaria Sand. “I will not kneel.” Sand said, voice wavering as she tried to project that famed Dornish resolve. The resulting bellow shook the glass in the room’s round windows and made Sand shy backward.

“Kneeling would be beside the point, Ellaria Sand.” Missandei said, the creature turning to peer at her. “I know the bearing of a sellsword when I see one. Even one so unusual as you.” Another yell, a primal wordless cry. That Missandei neither jumped nor made a sound seemed to give it pause. A dismissive snort later and it was poking its head back in the hall, speaking a harsh unruly tongue. It came back in, holding its club head down as it stood by the door. People began to filter in, Dornish, and for a moment Missandei was unsure just what was going on. Then she saw their gaping wounds, their torn bodies, their missing heads. Their ice blue eyes. _A darkness, the Queen named it,_ Missandei remembered. _From the furthest north._ Two beings as unlike the lanky sellswords as the sellswords were from Missandei came in next. One was armored in what looked like glass to a Naathi, yet from the northerners’ talk on Dragonstone she knew it for ice. He, it could only have been a he, had long hair bound up out of his eyes and held a spear that bore the still-snapping head of Obara Sand, one blue eye open and staring. The other was female and even slighter of build than Daenerys Targaryen, yet in the prime of womanhood for her kind for all that. Countless tiny spiders poured from her sleeves, her nape, from under her hem. Perhaps it was because she had so recently spoken of Yi Ti at length, but Missandei saw something both impossible and undeniable. “You have the Furthest East in you, of that I’m certain. How, I cannot say.” The spiders never stopped, from her person nor from the ceiling. While her companion only looked at Missandei as a boil to be lanced, the spider-bearer looked at her as a delicacy yet untasted. She came closer. Missandei could feel frost harden on her skin, chip against her lips. What passed full white pair before her were not words so much as sounds of the world, ones she had never heard. _Sounds one might, if only they went north far enough._

“If I am meant to understand, I must disappoint you.”

“She asks, _‘what are you?’_ ”

The voice was so rapt, the response so quick that for a moment Missandei thought the creature herself had spoken. On looking around, she could only see Ellaria cowering behind the spear throne.

“Pray tell, what are you to speak without a mouth?” she asked, paying no great regard to a person with which she could not speak anyway.

“The same that breathes without lungs, that blows without lips.” A chill breeze blew against Missandei’s neck. _Short,_ she thought.

“I’ve never spoken to the wind before.”

“A great many things have happened of late that have never happened before. Least of all speaking wind.”

“Or walking dead.”

“As it happens, the dead have walked ever since there were icy wills to move them. Hardly new.”

“I have never known the wind to be so glib.” More speech from the spider-bearer.

“She asks again.”

“I am an interpreter myself, in truth. I would be glad to answer if I knew who was so relaying my words.” A laugh, cold and careless.

“There is no _interpretation_ of the True Tongue. What is said is what is meant. Truth is all that can be relayed.” The snow that drifted from the ceiling past the pack began to spin and dance, plaything of the wind or whatever power gave it voice. Missandei saw something shape itself from the tumbling snow, first a head and then a body beneath it. But for the emptiness of it, the etherealness of it, it might have been mistaken for one of the walking dead. Wide blue eyes stared unblinkingly out from a beautiful face gone to ruin, frost gathering at the lips and nostrils. _A frozen last breath._ Cheekbones were visible beneath the peeling frostbitten skin and what remained of blonde hair turned to brittle white webbing the further from the skull it got. _A girl,_ Missandei realized, _with a dead orchid in her hair._

“I don’t suppose you’d answer the selfsame question yourself if I asked.” The arms came up, as transparent as the rest of her.

“Freely, to the best of my knowledge. Unfortunately for the both of us, I don’t have the first notion. I know only I can ride the breeze easier than any man ever rode a horse, that any weapon, from stone to steel, will no more harm me than grant me life anew, and that I have a single person to thank for the loss of the one I had.” Her head turned, long hair blowing on a breeze Missandei did not feel, toward the thrones. In an instant she was behind them, Ellaria squirming in her iron grip. “I cannot favor you with the warmth you once showed me. Allow me to repay you in coin of another kind.” The wind-thing said, putting her lifeless mouth to her captive’s. At once Missandei hear the churning of insides turned to ice, heard the cracking of bone as splinters of limb and rib ripped free of skin. What remained of Ellaria Sand lay prostate for only a moment before it began to move about, scuttling on broken limbs. The eyes had burst, yet Missandei knew if they had not, they would sear bright icy blue.

Speech from the spider-bearer made Missandei tear her eyes from the wind-thing and its new-made thrall.

“She asks once more.”

“Tell her I am Missandei of Naath.” Cold wind blew over her shoulder, but she could hear the meaning in it. _Speech._ Another smattering of cracking ice in reply.

“You are a long way from your birthplace.”

“As are you.” The wind-thing duly translated. This time the spider-bearer laughed; a sound as beautiful as it was terrifying.

“Further than you know.” The wind-thing did not need to add inflection for Missandei to know its accomplice was greatly amused.

“Why have you brought war here?”

“Actually, I can answer that. Dorne is known as the Empty Land in the True Tongue, and to be honest there has never been a better name for anything, ever. You’re no Dornishwoman but you’ve spent no fewer than a few months here. You know of what I speak. It is all pride and poison.”

“What is that to them?” Missandei asked, pointing to the bearer.

“Nothing. They don’t care a whit about this race or that, this house or that one.”

“Then why have they come here? Why now?”

“There are greater aims than the stomping out of a few snakes, to be sure, but I wasn’t about to let another do my stomping for me. Even one so… _footy_ as the Weaver.” The wind-thing took in the sight of the thrones for a long time before she appeared sitting primly in the spear-seat. “Dorne. If there were something in it worth keeping, I would not have come. Whilst here I endured no few threats, first veiled and then blatant even though I sought only to bind up the wounds it suffered in the past. A different princess’s ghost spurred Prince Oberyn to seek vengeance on Ser Gregor, and yet after the wheel had run the lot of us over beneath it, I’m the one left to haunt these halls. A Lannister. How did that come to pass, I wonder? I suppose it doesn’t matter. Dorne did not want me for a brief few decades, so it can have me forever. I will make Dorne the Empty Land for true.” Missandei heard clicking behind her, heard the drip of something hit the throne room’s marble floor. “Goodbye, Missandei of Naath.” Myrcella Baratheon said indifferently as Missandei beheld the Weaver’s waifish form melting away, an eight-legged abdomen taking the place of her slender legs and clicking fangs her pretty mouth. Before Missandei could think on Torgo Nudho, she felt twin daggers sink into her chest and watched her eyes go wide in the Weaver’s thousand own.


	3. Theon I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Iron Fleet returns to the Iron Islands.

Just when it seemed he’d be able to sleep even with the hell-wind screaming through the castle’s towers, Theon heard a bloodcurdling scream. He started out of bed half-blind and half-drunk, succeeding only in ringing his head rung against the stone doorframe of his room. _That would have hurt less were we underway._ Black Wind’s _wood instead of Ten Towers’ stone._ Two doors down he could still hear the Glover boy blubbering in shock- and smell the stink of the fishwaif as it burbled past the whelps’ door, on toward Theon. Uh oh. _What did I do now?_ Warily he waited for the thing to reach him, hoping it wouldn’t go all rigid. _A Myrish tube for something to peer above the waves with._ For once his luck held and the little thing merely croaked at him. _Honestly, it’s not so bad. Gods know once we make the north it will be all hateful glares. At least the fishheads just croak and poke at our steel._ Wearily he trudged past it, looking in on the Glovers. Not quite ten and not quite five. Erena hid behind Gawen, sniffling into his back as he gaped at Theon.

“Fish-people.” he said listlessly, shrugging, while the Glovers shook. _Then again, they’re only babes. I was shaking worse on going to Winterfell and all that waited for me there were Starks._ “I trust you’re ready to quit the Iron Islands, my lord. If not today, before the week is out. You should be on Bear Island within the month and back in Deepwood Motte not long after that.” There was a fit of whispering.

“Erena says it could be dangerous to go north. She’s scared of monsters.”

“There are monsters everywhere, my lady, and more come by the day. From the bottom of the sea, from the furthest east, from the furthest north. It almost makes you pine for the days when we fought over chairs, eh?” More whispering.

“She says she doesn’t want to go.” That threw Theon for a loop. _Then again, she was only a babe when she came to Ten Towers. It’s all she knows. If only Daenerys Targaryen was so reticent to leave Essos we might have steered clear of all this mess._

“You have a mother you’ve never met, my lady. A home you’ve never seen. In truth, Ten Towers is no fit place for a northern lass to come up.” _While Winterfell proved the perfect place for an iron lad to come to manhood._ He strained his ears but heard no forthcoming whisper.

“I’ll try and bring her ‘round, my lord.” Gawen said sullenly.

“Do that. Winter’s given us a few cushy kisses, these towers might come down when it brings its fists to bear.” Theon told him.

Gwynesse was still telling a much put-upon Reader that Ten Towers was hers by right when Theon found them in the hall, thralls moving trunks and sundry through the castle’s corridors down to the docks and from there aboard _Black Wind._ He tried a bit of salted cod, surprisingly fresh despite the long voyage from Dragonstone.

“Have you seen my mother, uncle?”

“She’s with your sister. It seems she needs a good bit of coaxing to quit Ten Towers for some uncertain place. Just where are we to go once the northerners have left our company?”

“Sea Dragon Point, Reader. As Asha said at the kingsmoot, those coasts are thinly peopled and have riches the islands can’t imagine. Timber, fields, furs.”

“What’s to stop the northmen from simply doing away with us?”

“Better a northman than the Crow’s Eye.” Rodrik gave a snort and for a moment Theon could see the iron beneath the parchment.

“You speak no lies, nephew. We’ll set off as soon as _Sea Song_ and the other ships are ready for a long haul.” _As good as it gets with the Reader,_ Theon thought. When he made to leave the hall he almost collided with Jorah Mormont. He looked singularly surly.

“There are more of them about.” he said. “It’s gotten to where I can smell them even through the water.”

“Your nose isn’t _that_ good, Mormont.” Theon replied. “There are a handful of passages down to the sand of the island even in a castle new as Ten Towers. Maybe they’ve gone and made camp down there.”

“We’d best go see. Elsewise I’m afraid someone’s left a ton of rotting fish out just to draw them on.” Theon shrugged and made to grab a torch, but Mormont grunted in displeasure.“You know they aren’t fond of fire.”

“I know too, that you need no light to see. I’ve no wish to slip on slick rounded steps, though.” At the top of one such stair in the armory, Theon set the torch alight. “I’ll go behind you is all.”

“Just don’t fall and send me falling down with you.” _As if it’d hurt,_ Theon thought. Even with the light of the torch he moved slowly, Mormont outpacing him a half-dozen times. Once he stepped into thin air and his stomach flipped only for his foot to find a step further down. His gasp, barely audible, still made Mormont spin and hold him in place.

“Fuck, I’d rather go down on hands and knees.” Theon said, feeling green.

“And break your nose on every stair.” Theon nearly said his nose hadn’t been broken (that he remembered) but Mormont was the sort of man who would happily grant him that honor. _See, I’m getting better at this all the time. Keeping my mouth shut._ Nearly five minutes of straight descent followed before Mormont spoke next. “It’s leveling out. Best douse that torch.” When he did, darkness swallowed Mormont and the caves both until Theon could make out only his hazy figure. _Aye, and the stink has gotten worse by the moment. We’re right on top of them._

In the days before the world had gone mad, the only visitors the dank cave-like additions to the ironborn castles had been priests of the Drowned God, bathing in seawater easier to get to and hidden from the commons. _Even among the priestly vagabonds, noble blood does come to bear. Fucking Damphair._ The pools were not overlarge, but Theon knew they ran deep. For how long, no man could say. _Until we teach a maester fish-croak._ The creatures were nowhere in sight, but their stink lingered like an oil stain.

“How long until they appear?” Mormont grunted grumpily.

“Fucked if I know. Got a fishing pole?” Silence fell as moments became minutes, yet still the fish-heads did not surface.

“I suppose they just left.” Mormont said finally, turning to Theon.

“Let’s be off, Greyjoy.” Theon didn’t move. “Greyjoy?” Mormont’s voice sounded as though Theon were underwater, a rushing in his ears quickly drowning the northman out. The darkness began to lift but slowly, and he found himself standing on a sort of reef- staring up at a great swirling mass of liquid glass. _The surface, seen from below._ Theon had gotten somewhat used to the intrusions, they were no flensing knife, but the dozens of long shapes that cut through the glass were another matter. _A fleet, well on its way. But who? Nobody else is this close to the Islands._ He blinked and found himself back in the cave, teeth gritted so hard they felt like to crack. Mormont prodded him. “If you’re going to have a fit, this is the place. No need to scare the Glovers with your sea-madness.” _Madness would be fine enough,_ Theon thought. _Instead, it’s all impending doom._ Suddenly the reek hit again, fresh and oily. Then they began to slide from the pools in almost complete silence, until the dingy cave had room enough only to stand. Theon smelled them more than saw them. _They’re even worse in the close darkness, where the stink has nowhere to go._ They seemed alert, even agitated. More than one bore the marks of recent battle, dark slits and scratches on this one and that bleeding still, gleaming in the dim light.

“What happened to you?” Theon asked, his voice lost in the shuffling of slimy bodies and smacking on the sand of fishy feet. _Not a word of Common Tongue between the school of them, most like. But there’s another tongue I know, apparently, that may reach them._ “Mormont, why don’t you head on up? If I’m not there in ten minutes, just leave without me.”

“Your sister will never allow it.”

“Then say rather I’ll meet her later on.” Mormont didn’t move, though out of northern obstinacy or pigheadedness Theon didn’t know. “The Crow’s Eye could be upon us at any moment. You’d best get gone before he realizes he’s been robbed blind.” Almost with a reluctant look on his face, the knight turned and started up the stairs. _Now there’s no one here to hear…_ Theon shook himself and tried to remember how to make the gurgling sounds. At first it just sounded like he was gagging up a piece of meat, then there were breaks I the gibberish and Theon could hear words. He heard a school’s worth of fishy jaws drop slack, knew he had every bulging yellow eye on him.

 _The last time I tried to rally men I took an oar to the back of the head._ He thought the words out a bit at a time, thinking in the Common Tongue but speaking whatever hell-gurgle he’d been gifted.

“What happened to you?” he thought, his gurgling notwithstanding. The croaking then was maddening, echoing off the walls in a pandemonic uproar, until a single croaker squeezed past its fellows to stand before Theon. The stink made him tear and his nose twitch in agony, but when its needled maw parted no croaking passed from within it. Instead a booming voice filled the cave, rich and resounding, one that somehow didn’t echo. The other fish-men flopped down in reverence. The voice spoke in the selfsame tongue, though Theon understood without a hitch.

“You have enemies all about you. This does not please me, it does us no good if we cannot hold up our side of the arrangement.”

“Uhh, _what?”_

“Go with your kind. You have precious little time and that afforded you is rolling back even now.” _Sounds like a good idea. Anything to be far from whatever’s beneath the waves, pulling strings._

“We’re doing just fine, as far as the ‘arrangement’. Ironborn are no less goatheaded than northmen given the chance, and where we’re going is no balmy beach.”

“You asked to be informed should your enemies rear their heads. You have been. That is the arrangement I was referring to.” The memory of the blue-skinned man sparked with a vengeance. His voice had been deep then, rich and bass, but the power that coursed out like heat from a bonfire had been quite absent.

“Seaworth’s son.” Theon gave a sigh of relief. “You could have said as much, I was expecting something quite else.” His glibness did not please the man, wherever he really was. _Likely still doting on his mother. Or else I’ve pulled him from a harem of mermaids, and he has every right to be short with me._ Theon felt rather abashed.

“I am a worthy son of the sea. My siring makes no matter and what name I might have above the waves still less so.”

“Right.”

“Go now. Before the fight comes to you while you are yet unready.” The fish-head jerked out of its trance, croaking excitedly. Clearly, Seaworth had gone. Theon stewed in the darkness, feeling so much like a scolded child or a boy told he was not ready to sail. Once he lost the fish-heads’ interest he turned and felt his way back up the stairs in a definite sulk. _How much more ready can I be? The Crow’s Eye is only a man, Silence only a ship. Both can be sunk easily enough._

The caves had reeked of fish-head, but at least they were warm. The cold built as Theon ascended until he could hear the curses of men topside grumbling about the sudden wintery front. _Eye-opening. Winters are cold._ He rolled his eyes. When he finally reached the hall though, he steadily reconsidered. His hands jittered from cold even through leather gloves and he slipped one of his fur pairs on to keep what fingers remained to him. _Still, I’d rather be here freezing than in Dorne abed with the Sand Snakes._ The same could not be said for Asha, visibly discomfited at the state of the Iron Islands all her past bluster aside. Even so, Theon felt no need to make mock of her.

“You’re still not gone?”

“I wasn’t about to leave without you. What kept you?”

“I had a chat with that seaborne prick.”

“He’s here?” The color rose in Asha’s cheeks.

“Relax. He spoke to me through a croaker, and only in Croakish. Nothing much for you to miss.” Her lips pursed. “Are we about ready to go?”

“Once Mormont pries the Damphair’s fingers from the castle’s doorframe. I don’t think he’s so keen to leave.”

“Neither am I now that I’m back. I can’t bloody well go back to Winterfell and nobody’s going to welcome a ruined ironman, so the islands are all I have left to me. You may yet find a place for Asha, but Theon’s was sacked and burned.” Her indignant blush vanished as quickly as it had come.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I’ve got no particular wish to run this time. At least, to run from.” _I ran from Robb when I thought it would make me a prince. I ran from Euron when he took the Islands. I ran from Ramsay when I ought have killed him with my own ruined hands. I am done with running_ from. She stared at him.

“Theon, there’s no call for you to throw your life away so uselessly-”

“Here, Winterfell or somewhere in between, it doesn’t much matter. I may yet survive anyway; I’ve gotten this far.” She looked ready to argue further but the Reader preceded her.

“We’re ready to set off. Harlaw’s remaining ships are fitted and gathered just offshore, _Black Wind_ just needs to start north for the fleet to follow.” Asha looked from him to Theon, at a loss for words. _What the fuck am I doing?_ He thought, wondering just what drove him to such futility. _Euron will come and deal with me. Asha can put more open water between_ Silence _and_ Black Wind _in the meantime,_ he answered himself. No doubt the fish-heads were comfortable enough in the dank pools beneath Ten Towers as well as the other castles on the islands, likely unwilling to give them up to one such as the Crow’s Eye. _I suppose I have more in common with them than I thought._ He got a last long look from his sister before she turned to leave, only to crash headlong into a lad red in the face and breathing hard.

“Longships from the northwest, dozens of them, it looks like the Iron Fleet’s returned!” the runner cried.

“Never mind dying alone then, Theon. We’ll kill the Crow’s Eye together or die in the attempt.” Asha said through gritted teeth.

“No, my lady. _Silence_ isn’t leading them, but _Iron Victory!_ The Lord Captain has returned!” the boy said, pointing at the hall door.

“The last we heard of Victarion, he was reeling in the Shields.” The Reader said dubiously.

“Euron must have tasked him with ‘rescuing’ the ironborn still stuck on the northern coast. Probably hoping the wolves would succeed where the roses failed.” Asha replied, while Theon only looked to the north. The fleet massed at vision’s edge was no mirage. Despite the cutting of the cold wind and the fat falling flakes it grew steadily closer, seemingly heedless of the worsening weather.

“They’re against the wind.” Rodrik said. “Their oarsmen will be useless if they push on too much longer.”

“Who is Victarion eager to return to, though, Reader? The Damphair or Euron?” Asha asked. Theon thought along similar lines. _It isn’t in Victarion to go against his elder brother, even when the Damphair pleads for him to do so. The ox deaf to all but the one farmer he will heed._ The wind cut deeper and the flakes grew fatter.

“Miserable fucking weather to row in.” Theon muttered, yet the arriving ships did not slow down. He heard the Reader extend a Myrish eye and raise it close to his own.

“Can you see anybody?” Asha asked hurriedly. Theon watched as his uncle’s mouth soured into a frown.

“Their sails are coated in a sheen of ice. It’s taken to their hulls and masts as well.”

“What? But they’re only sailing from so far north, Uncle.” Asha said quite unnecessarily.

“They could be sailing from hell. They look as though a blizzard has had its way with them for days.” Theon took the eye and looked again to the northern horizon. The longships were advancing with truly incredibly speed. Just how Victarion, a man with less imagination than a statue, had managed such a feat was lost on Theon. Closer, he could see the ice that had formed to keep each ship seaworthy, great slabs shoved ramshackle into gaps in the wood to prevent sinking- if only for a time. _We ought hear them,_ Theon thought. _Hear their curses and cries of_ ‘Land!’. A sinking feeling formed in his stomach. _Oh, I think we’re in for an ass-fucking._ There were figures on the decks of the ships, but they weren’t moving as sailors ought. Rowing benches were filled and the men working them churning away with tremendous endurance, in such unison Theon could not believe his own eyes. _They’re headed straight for the beach,_ he realized. _They have no intention of docking first._

“I think we’d best get back to the castle,” he said, growing more certain of his words as the line of ships became clearer. “Uh, right now.” he added. Only when the silence remained unbroken for several more minutes did people finally get moving, Theon hastily poking more than one back to hurry them along. _No need to panic,_ he thought, the feeling rising from the pit of his belly. Jon’s words sprang to mind, fear of some mysterious enemy from the north. _He said they’d come,_ _the islands peopled enough to be worth scouring._ The wind picked up again, far more effective than Theon’s urging at getting the lot of them back behind Ten Towers’ stone walls. _Even among family, better safe than Stark._

Clouds once cotton went the color of iron, sending off what sun the day would give them. Theon groaned from Ten Towers’ ramparts, having spent enough time in the north to know what to expect. Sure enough, the snow was joined by driving rain, drops that felt like needles against Theon’s face. _Bloody fuck, it’s worse than snow. Worse than I remember, even._ Visibility fell to within a few strides, then a few feet. Without Asha standing next to him Theon might have suspected she’d fallen from the parapet. Even with the Myrish eye it was anyone’s guess just what Victarion was up to in the bay. Then there was a sharp chorus of crunching, of ships beyond count running aground in the shallows of Harlaw. Theon heard the waters churn and froth as if in the grip of a terrible storm. _More terrible than a few painful drops and numbing flakes ought warrant, anyway._ Maybe Victarion had insisted a watery landing to please the Drowned God? _He’s certainly stupid enough._ Still, there were no cries nor calls from the landing ironmen. Twin great spouts of water fountained up from the churning deep. Theon spotted even through the rain and snow a steadily surfacing mass of ice. _A glacier out of one of Luwin’s lessons, shaped jagged-like. One shark fin after another._ There was a tremendously loud grinding sound, of ice on ice he supposed. What came next was like nothing he’d ever heard, beautiful as a maiden’s voice and more terrible than any scream he’d given at Ramsay’s hands. A light, bright as day, glittered midway up the frontmost fin. Then Ten Towers was shaking beneath Theon’s feet, the world gone white in a blinding flash. The sound came again, the shock came again, and he could hear the fucking castle coming apart. _They’re loosing at us,_ he thought dimly. _What, how, who can guess-_ A third sound, and this time the stones beneath his feet flew up, flew back, throwing Theon bodily from the ramparts. He came to his senses with a gasp, trying to force air back into his body, coughing and twitching until he finally filled his lungs. Disoriented, he felt around to try and determine if it was safe to stand. Though his back ached to no end, it did not feel as though he’d been truly hurt. When he stretched out his left hand, he found only air. _Had I fallen another foot to the left, I might have been splattering in the yard instead of slapping against the landing._ Still woozy he sat up, trying to get his legs to agree to carry him. _There we are,_ he thought, rubbing his calves even as the rain sought to drive them numb again.

“Fuck.” he gasped, unable to get anything more out as he moved to stand. A loud, hoarse bellowing in the yard below stunned him still, his heart beating faster than he could count. _At least the rain has stopped._ Snow fell and snow alone, the voices in the yard undeterred.

Slowly he rolled onto his side, then his belly, peering down with one eye. A half-dozen men…things… were moving about in the yard, each eight or nine feet tall and holding a thick wooden shaft capped with a twinkling two-foot tip of ice. _Those don’t look anything like Jon told,_ Theon thought. Where are the castle’s defenders? He looked down to see that whatever the ice-ship had loosed had cleanly succeeded in blasting away the castle’s gate. Blinking the last of the fog out of his eyes he could see the lanky brutes were not alone. Men dashed pell-mell this way and that, weapons in their hands swinging blindly through the air or else hands outstretched. The smell of low tide reached him next. _Not men. Our own flotsam thrown back at us._ Many still had flesh to burn, but more still were little else than skeletons swinging axes or thrusting spears. Who knew how many bodies had laid only feet below the surface of Harlaw? _The Others, apparently,_ Theon thought, trying not to vomit. More telling was the lack of sounds of battle. _Have I missed it?_ He saw no trace of anyone he’d come ashore with, nor for. Theon prayed to any god who’d listen that they’d somehow gotten quit of Harlaw before the dead men had pressed on from the beaches. _No need for docks when you can just founder hulk after hulk and let your masses pour out of them, like ants out of a hill._ He got onto all fours, edging out of sight, crawling as quickly as he dared back toward the nearest of the castle’s towers. _No using the front door. Not that there’s a front door to use anymore,_ he mused. _It’s either jump or go back down that stair. In pitch darkness, too._ Theon inched his way over the threshold, rubbing his sore ribs as he stood. The clattering of bones caught his ear and he surged forward out of instinct, spinning away from a thrust cutlass as he grabbed the first thing he could reach, a golden candlestick likely plunder from a raid on the westerlands by a long-dead Harlaw. He parried the cutlass easily enough, the skeleton’s swings and jabs utterly without reserve. Theon felt almost a fool when he brought the candlestick down on the thing’s bony elbow after a particularly daring thrust threw it off-balance. It splintered immediately, though the skeleton paid the injury no mind as it took to swinging its balled fist. Theon rapped his weapon against the tide-bleached skull, hearing the bone crack against the gold. The force of Theon’s blow knocked his enemy backward, reeling on bony feet. _Of bloody fucking course, how much can a skeleton weigh?_ He rushed it again and with a single maimed hand was able to grip the backbone beneath the skull and heave the skeleton, dashing it against the stone wall. Bones snapped, chipped, broke, yet the thing gave no sign the blows had in any way hurt it. Limping forward, it feebly lashed out with its remaining fist. _Fuck this._ Another blow with the candlestick knocked the skull free of its bony body, another shove saw it dashed against the floor. Theon looked on, breathing hard. _What power moves them must pool within the bones, else a bare skeleton could not move._

He stood there, clutching the candlestick, when a fit of laughter found him. He clapped his hand over his mouth, half dismayed and half ecstatic. _The first enemy I’ve bested in a fair fight since I don’t know when. Maybe ever._ He was still laughing when the sounds of countless running feet sounded from the tower’s stair. _Right, that was stupid,_ he thought, still grinning despite the crisis. He pushed a nearby heavy wooden table flush against the door, yet another up to brace the first. Then his smile died. _What is that going to stop, Theon Greyjoy? One? Two? How about ten? A hundred? A thousand?_ He turned away from the stair, running and mumbling incoherently. _How am I going to get out of here? I can’t well jump into the sea from the ramparts!_ The noise behind him advertised just how badly the tables had failed to stymie the oncoming dead, flesh or bone. As he was facing forward, he avoided falling into a gap in the ramparts, a great fissure formed from one of the ice-ship’s blows. _It’s either jump or meet the dead,_ he figured, so he gave himself some room and ran directly at the gap, leaping as far forward as he could manage. Immediately he saw his folly and lowered expectations accordingly, a single gloved hand finding purchase on the rampart’s stony walkway. Dangling like a worm from a small boy’s fist, tongue between his teeth, Theon tried to pull himself up only for his hand to slip against the rain-slick stone. To further fray his nerves, the dead sounded almost flush with the very ledge he’d jumped from. _Down it is,_ he decided, using the candlestick as a pick to quickly descend down the fissure. _Right, right, that’s it, make the fall into the yard a bit less death-defying._ The dead did not pursue him down, likely from a lack of finer movement. _Let’s see a skeleton climb down after me._

“Bony cunts!” he cried, cackling with glee again. The bottom of the great crack in the castle wall stopped his descent but with only fifteen feet to fall Theon slipped from the rend in the stone, landing with nary a sore foot. _Or I’m too numb from cold to notice._ He straightened to find himself staring directly at the lanky brutes, each regarding him with pronounced distaste. “Uh. I thought I’d escaped.” Theon said lamely, almost apologetically. The nearest creature’s bellow spurred his flight, dashing madly past a gaggle of skeletons and sending one flailing into its fellows’ midst. A sudden grunt and Theon ducked. An icy maul buried itself in the wall where his head had been a half-moment before, a brute clad in gleaming silver scale roaring in fury as he brought his fist down next. Theon rolled over and jabbed out with the candlestick, planting it soundly in the thing’s blue right eye. Howling in agony it pursued even as Theon fled, maul knocking holes in Ten Tower’s masonry no man could ever manage. _The stair,_ he remembered, _down to the pools!_ Then he remembered the dead men, how they could only have emerged from the surf. _It’s a chance I’ll have to take. Even if they kept some wandering around Harlaw looking for hidden ways in, that’s no guarantee they found one. Much less the one I plan to use to escape!_ The castle was oddly empty in proportion to the masses that had come ashore, though Theon suspected during his senselessness atop the ramparts the castle had been scoured and the horde had moved on to likewise pick over the island proper. _My luck,_ he wondered. _As the others die to a man, I lie in shock out of sight._ The stair down was obstructed by a trio of the walking corpses, though a good shove sent them tumbling down the steps while Theon followed as quick as he could manage without slipping. The caves were dim as they had been before, but Theon could see the flickering of the nearest pool regardless. At once he took as deep a breath as he could hold and dove in, swimming to the bottom and then crawling into a flooded tunnel leading out away from the cave and Ten Towers above it. Just as he was running out of air, he found a hollow space above the water just big enough to fill his lungs again. Before he resubmerged to make good his push to freedom, if freedom lay at the end of the tunnel, Theon was possessed of a last comforting thought. _If I drown, they’ll never find my body._


	4. Daenerys I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daenerys receives startling news.

There was nothing, truly nothing, like the feeling of flying. The wonderful pulling in Daenerys’ chest as her body swayed this way and that, a plaything of the winds with only the loosest balance, the least control… _And yet, this is nothing like that._ Her body felt like one long powerful lance of muscle and the wind that whipped her hair into an unholy mess only Missandei could untangle had yet to blow into her face. The world was one long unbroken line of blue, some strange wordless part of her mind quite taken aback by the lack of something. _Just ocean. For leagues, for miles, for ever more, it seems._ She flew until the sun had twice risen and set, her body dreadfully sore and aching to the bone, yet the sea had yet to yield even a sandbar. _It just keeps going,_ she thought, while that other part of her bristled at the unspoken challenge. _There is nothing more to see,_ she told herself. _Nowhere more to go. I must have flown from Meereen to Dragonstone and back, and yet, nothing._ Then that other part, that wordless pride, _huffed._ A loud tempestuous snort that tried to hide her failing strength, her slow decline. At long last she could fly no more and pitched gracefully from the sky, the great blue above blending into the one below. This time the wind did whip into her face, blowing the breath from her lungs, as the tiny wiggling worms became great crashing waves. _A long way to fall,_ she wondered. She could hear the sea roiling, smell the brine and taste the salt. Just before she met the water, she woke up in Jon Snow’s arms. The King in the North’s arm was snugly wrapped about her belly and his fur cape was pulled over them both, quite efficient at keeping out the rare gusts that made it into Drogon’s lair in the Dragonmont. It was snowing, the cold bits of fluff tickling Dany’s exposed nose and cheeks, but she found she did not mind in the least. _Surely, I’ll see snows colder and crueler than this. Particularly with where I’m headed._ Not for the first time Dany felt a certain foreboding at the prospect of going north, of going to the North. _Giants, wolves the size of horses with the minds of men, savages from a hundred hundred tribes…and a race shaped as if from ice itself, intent solely on doing away with all the rest._ Meereen had been an unending exercise in tedium, though perhaps that was the idea. _If people have taxes and slavery to complain about it means that war, famine and plague are elsewhere._ Still, Dany had no illusions that she was the person most fit to lead in peace. Peace was boring, plenty an insidious slip into complacency. _After all, dragons are not peaceful creatures. I may not be Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, but I am the Mother of Dragons. Nothing and no one can take that from me. I am the Mother of Dragons, the Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea. I am the Breaker of Chains. If anyone belongs somewhere where myth and mundane are one and the same, I do._

Jon muttered in his sleep, something in the Old Tongue. Dany had no more knowledge of it than he did of Dothraki, yet she could hear the affection, the cherishing in the rough stony words. _Even in dreams, eager to go back to where walls cannot constrain him._ She found she could not fault him, not the King in the North, a man who loved freedom so fiercely. _Maybe I’ve a soft spot for it. Khal Drogo was no different in that regard._ The atonal noisy squawking of Dragonstone’s gulls made her murmur in irritation and hide under Jon’s cape. _Go away,_ she ordered in her mind. Could they not see the two were sleeping? _There’s no Drogon here to scare them away, they’re likely feasting on the leftover fish the townsfolk missed._ She tried to drift back off, back to where Jon Snow waited for her, but all that happened was her temper got the better of her and she burst from the cape, bellowing in Dothraki and throwing whatever bits of rock and bone she could reach in the dragon’s nook. Dany blushed when a thought came to her. _I sound like an angry child, not intimidating in the least. No doubt I’ll turn and see him red in the face and weeping from laughter._ Rather than look to him she tried climbing up to where one of the damnable birds sat, a fat grey gull who paid her not the least bit mind. Aside from a hand cut on the rocks she didn’t make much progress, wincing in pain as she sucked on the cut. _As independent as a child as well. I couldn’t so much as tie my braids if left to my own devices._ She stomped away from the wall of razor rock, sat down in the middle of the clearing and promptly crossed her arms in a royal huff. _Could Jon have truly slept through all that?_ Curiously she turned to check on him and instantly wished she hadn’t. Rather than laughing up a storm, the King in the North lay curled on his side, lost for breath with tears streaming down his long northern face. Her mood only got fierier, and in a few moments she let out a little scream of frustration as she pounced on him.

“I may not command the gulls, but you _will_ heed me, Jon Snow!” she commanded, hands upon his shoulders. His laughter amused her as it infuriated her, so she pressed her lips to his if only to silence him! _That’s better,_ she thought at once, while his hand grazed up her arm. “Hmmmph!” she said, mouth still to his.

“Hmph.” Jon replied, giving her backside a gentle squeeze. Voices from down the mountain made her groan, going to a whimper when he removed his hand. “Dany, we’d best get going anyway. There’s no time to lose.” She lay her head on his chest, trying to shut out the rising voices on the beach. She was no naïve maiden in a story, she knew he was right, but that didn’t make it easier to get up, nor to shake the snow from her hair.

“This had better be good.” she muttered, singularly grumpy.

Dany entertained the idea of having Jon carry her down the stairs just to be difficult, but the voices on the beach quickly turned unfriendly and so the pair of them hastily made their descent. _It’s not so bad when you can run,_ she thought. Once on the bottom landing, her breath hitched in her chest. Ships, she thought. Some were pooling on Dragonstone’s shoreline or in the port town, while others sailed past the island to the north and south. _To land elsewhere,_ she thought. _They’re no longships…they look Essosi. Volantene. I of all people would know, save me._ She swallowed, feeling increasingly nervous. Had the slavers followed her across the Narrow Sea? Had a triarchy made much the poorer by slavery’s death sent a fleet after her? Jon’s breath stalled behind her, though out of similar thoughts or something else she could not say. “Who are these, then?” he asked, sliding an arm around her waist. “I’m not certain.” she replied. “Well, better get down there before they spot any man-fishes. I can’t imagine the man who would take them much in stride.” he said, sounding his ever-weary self. _And I had him ready to chase me around Drogon’s lair. Hmph! Stupid war._ Once they reached the beach, she spotted several men arguing near the shoreline. At once, some nearby Unsullied took up positions around her, Jon moving out of the way to let them. From behind their slender forms she tried to make out what was being said.

“…crossed the fucking Narrow Sea to come here, you have not the first inkling-” Her jaw dropped. _I left him in Meereen._ More choice words were exchanged before she could think any farther.

“What’s that to me, cunt? If your hair’s any tell, you stood at the bow like a maiden’s dream the whole way. Meantime, the rest of us are like to laugh ourselves shitless at the sight of you.” It sounded like Tyrion’s pet sellsword. _At least it isn’t northmen. Fists would have flown by now._ Something still teased at her. _This seems more than Daario would bother, even given his affection. I did leave him Regent of the Bay of Dragons, surely any man would have sat on those laurels._ She slid deftly behind one of the Unsullied, trying to keep out of sight. Noticing her sudden timidness, Jon walked past her and over to the men.

“Who are you?” he asked Daario. The sellsword seemed taken aback, spotting at last the phalanx of Unsullied. _Oh no,_ Dany thought, despairing.

“Move up.” she commanded in Valyrian, the soldiers maintaining their formation without a second thought. Daario looked past them, his face the same stunned-witless mask it had been when last she saw him. “I left you in charge of the Bay of Dragons.”

“The dragon left.” he replied. “My interest in Meereen left with her.” _Ever the sellsword. I’m sure you looted the place and fled with your Storm Crows as soon as I was beyond the horizon._ Were she to voice the thought, would he even bother to deny it?

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“For you.” he answered, as she knew he would.

She took in what men had come along with him. One she recognized, if faintly. _One of the Masters. Why could he have come?_ The man looked at her with listless, almost _lifeless_ eyes. _There is something awry here. Some greater purpose than a sellsword’s besottedness._ “Who took you across the Narrow Sea?” Daario didn’t answer right away, still torn between her and Jon. _He looks as if he’s wrestling with something greater than himself._ Ever had that been Daario’s way. They’d shared many nights in Meereen, but Daario Naharis seemed to know instinctively when his abilities were outsized by his circumstances. _An apprehension in his nature he shows no one but me. To all others he’s the fearless swashbuckling Storm Crow._ “The Golden Company.” he said, after an inner struggle.

“What do the Golden Company want with Westeros?” Jon asked in turn. When it became evident Daario was going to be of no help one of his cohorts, a Basilisk Islander, shouldered him aside.

“Malko, of Port Plunder, Your Worship. When you left slavery bleeding in the dust, silver queen, it turned Essos into chaos. A few of us saw the situation for what it was quick enough to turn sellsword and join the fleet massing in Volantis. Nobody was being turned away, not even Ghiscari.” The sullen man’s mouth twitched.

“To what end, Malko of Port Plunder?”

“To empty the red castle of lions and sit a dragon in its iron seat.”

“I needed no aid-” When Malko interrupted her he seemed almost abashed.

“Not you, Your Worship. It was an Aegon the sweepings of the east flocked to, if for no other reason than to leave Essos behind.” Her heart felt like it had stopped. _An Aegon, like the one killed while still in his swaddling on Tywin Lannister’s orders. An Aegon like I might have married had House Targaryen never fallen._

“There are no Aegons. The last died with his sister during Robert’s Rebellion.”

“No, Daenerys. If the tale is true, that same whelp was smuggled out one way or another and has his sights on retaking Westeros for House Targaryen, same as you.” Daario’s silence finally broke. At once she knew none of the men were this proclaimed prince, none could pass for Valyrian stock praying to all the gods together.

“Where is he?” she asked, looking uncertainly to Jon. _He cares not for talk of dragons nor kings, only what this news might mean to me._ For _me._ “Just offshore. His court as it were thought it best to see what was what before dumping him in your lap.” Daario said. His amiable words did not hide the real reason this Aegon had not yet landed himself. _They want to make sure I am not hostile to the idea of a male claimant to the Iron Throne._ She wondered what this man who claimed to be her blood would think, would _say,_ on learning what had transpired during her time in Westeros. _At least the Dothraki and the Unsullied fight for me, not for gold or personal gain. What sort of man would take slavers, pirates and sellswords on to help him win a kingdom?_ She answered herself. _The same sort that would sell his sister to bloodthirsty savages for a chance at that same kingdom._

Dany walked away from Daario Naharis then, heading back to the close sharp safety of the Dragonmont’s base. Out of sight of the rest, she collapsed against the grey stone, sitting on the smooth stone landing. More than one gasp escaped her as she tried to comport herself, but it was a losing battle. In mere moments she was in tears, forehead on her knees and her face buried in her legs. _Is this what Arya Stark felt when she saw Jon after years apart?_ There had been no doubt, no conflicted feelings visible in the princess’s reaction. Not when she ran at him, not when she wrapped her arms around him. There was no possibility of Jon being feigned, either. _Not with that long face and those grey eyes, so like the princess._ Of her family Dany had known only Viserys, a shadow’s shadow. _I’m not like to see myself in this Aegon, be he prince or peasant._

“A lot of explaining will need to be done.” Jon Snow’s voice called from somewhere above her. Looking up quickly in surprise, she beheld his head sticking out from a jut of rock a few feet above her. _He must be lying out on it, lazy and spying!_ She sniffled and wiped her nose.

“You’ve no right to be eavesdropping.”

“None at all. What are _you_ going to do about it?” he said, yawning down at her. She earned a yelp when the snowball she tossed found his northern nose, face quickly disappearing. The scuffling above told her that she was due for a return volley with interest, so she cuddled close to the stone to reduce her viability as a target. _Stupid ranger training,_ she thought sulkily. _Always sneaking and spying and stealing me for a kiss when I ought be doing other things!_ A snowball exploded directly under the rock but defiladed as she was it seemed even a seasoned ranger like Jon Snow could find no way to make his throws count.

“Ha! Some ghost you are!” she cried defiantly, only to shriek in dismay when a whole curtain of snow came down from above, as if he’d pushed all of it off the rock at once! She dashed out from her sanctuary to avoid it, but she only found herself scooped into a pair of arms as soon as she was clear of the rock. “Cheater! You’re a poor sport.” she said, burying her face this time in Jon Snow’s chest as he laughed. “Now I’m cold.”

“You’re never cold.”

“I am now.”

“Not compared to me.”

“Hmph.”

“Hmph, hmph.”

 _“Hmph!”_ Dany snorted, crossing her arms. “Carry me back to the beach.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I command it.”

“So?”

“I’m a queen.”

“And?”

 _“Hmph!”_ she huffed, feeling her cheeks go red. “You’ll do it,” she said, “because I’m _your_ queen.”

“Only if you let your hair down when we come to Winterfell.”

“I’ll do what I want.” she replied.

“As do I. I’ll carry you because I _want_ to, not because you asked, and _certainly_ not because you’re a queen.” In that vein Jon Snow bore her in his arms. She grumbled under her breath about savages and stubborn northmen as they returned to the steadily growing group of men on the beach. _This Aegon may be the perfect prince, Dany thought. I’ll not be parted from my stealing ghost for anything. Stubborn as a tree stump though he may be._

The newly arrived were just more fodder, that much was obvious. Sellswords out of every Free City and what was once Slaver’s Bay, each man ruined by her war against slavery and forced to hold the steel themselves or starve. _It wasn’t just the wealthy who wanted me dead or gone,_ she thought. _Ghiscari commoners held themselves above slaves and I put an end to that division, to say nothing of middlingly wealthy men who could not recover from their wealth in flesh disappearing overnight._ That this Prince Aegon would use such men to further his own cause made the taste in Daenerys’ mouth all the worse. “You’ll want to give the water some space.” she told a group of them in Valyrian as they talked about the castle overhead, a genuine work of the Freehold at its height. They looked at her with combinations of distaste and confusion. “Fish-men.” she said. “Walking fish.” _Likely they think me mad. Let them, then let them soil themselves when the morning’s treasure washes ashore. It’s nearly time._ Sure as sunrise a detachment of Unsullied marched down from the castle, paying no mind whatsoever to the newly landed strangers. _Surely all the best has been pushed ashore already,_ she thought. Dragonstone’s vaults were so full its empty dungeons were put to use holding the excess treasure and even they were nearly at capacity. There hadn’t been time to examine it in detail, Tyrion and Varys had given it a go the first day and weren’t close to finished when the second day dawned, and their work had compounded. “Will this prince be joining us presently?” Dany asked the group at large. _They just came for gold,_ she thought. _Nobody in his inner circle will have come ashore with Essos’ chaff._

“His wet nurse, the lordly, _lordly_ Lord Jonnington-”

 _"_ _C_ _onnington,_ Salladhor.” One of the other pirate captains corrected him.

“Pretentious as a preening peacock amongst his hens, I name him. He ought wear one in place of dancing griffins.” There was a goodly amount of chuckling and laughter at this, even from the Ghiscari which surprised Daenerys. At her evident uncertainty the man’s mirth was renewed. “Salladhor Saan, Your Grace, of Lys.”

“Forgive me, but you don’t look Lyseni.” Dany replied doubtfully.

“I made no claim to _be_ Lyseni. Only that I was of Lys. A man may be _of_ one place and _from_ another. I am not having the pale skin and fair hair that so makes Lys famous, this is true. No more than you look queenly with your stained leather vest, knotted hair and crownless brow. Yet for all this lacking you are doing, you are a queen, yes?” _Was that an insult or a compliment?_ Occasionally Dany had pangs of homesickness for how things were in Essos, but such ways of speaking were not something she especially missed. _At least the northmen speak plainly._

“That depends on who you ask, Salladhor Saan.” she replied finally. It was the pirate’s turn to frown in confusion. Dany gave a small shy smile, feeling a little better at paying him back in the same coin. A chorus of displeased swearing and complaints accompanied by the strong smell of fish made Dany turn to the waves, several fish-men wading to the beach while still more popped their heads above the surface. The screaming started moments later. Luckily the Unsullied sergeant on duty had the wherewithal to order the Essosi kept at bay while the Narrow Sea’s denizens came ashore. At once Dany spotted gashes in their pot bellies, even missing eyes and limbs. They were terse and high-strung, needly jaws set an inch or so apart. _A fish-man’s way of grinding his teeth. They’ve seen battle recently and had their slimy hides bruised._ She’d thought them eerie when they came before, croaking and squawking among themselves in tones of dull conversation, but this was starkly different. All Dany could hear was the seawater bubbling out down their gills and whatever lungs lay within take long heaving breaths, the slits that served as nostrils flaring. _I hope they brought someone who speaks the Common Tongue…_ As she had the thought the waters parted yet again and the burned man stepped out of the surf. Though he was near to her, his words were for Jon Snow.

“Your dead men fight livelier than most living.” he said, panting hard. Dany watched the last of the morning’s merriment disappear from Jon’s face behind a brooding pall.

“They do, Matthos Seaworth. That’s precisely the problem.”

On seeing Salladhor Saan, Matthos huffed in derision and turned to the fish-man nearest him, croaking gutturally. Evidently it took a moment for the Lyseni to realize just what, then who he was looking at.

“My friend’s good fortune proves proof against even wildfire, it seems. Either that or your salty Seaworth hide. You have your father’s gift of coming back to life.”

“All such allows is to die a second time.”

“At least you’ve stopped giving the red woman’s ravings more credence than your father’s sound words. All it took was a fleet of men lost in green flame to make you see sense.” Matthos Seaworth seemed almost chastised. _More talk of R’hllor,_ Dany thought. Worship of the Red God was somewhat commonplace in Essos but she’d seen no trace of it here on the other side of the Narrow Sea.

“It wasn’t a red god that gave me breath below the waves, nor cast me up again in time.” His words were sullen. _An apology, or one as like as he’s to give._ While the Essosi were still gaping at the fish-men, Daenerys idly scooped a handful of glittering coins from the sand and began tossing them at her guests.

“I’ll not pay you an iron bit for your losses endured in the end of slavery. Quite removed from that matter, I’ve more treasure than my vaults can hold, my dungeons too. It pleases me to be rid of the least part, and so I put the burden upon your sore shoulders.” she said, looking to the Ghiscari in particular. _The Dothraki do not buy and sell, but they do give gifts. Hopefully those who’ve come from slavery’s ruin can see that._

“Where did you fight them?” Jon asked.

“Dead ships sail blindly once the Narrow Sea opens into the Shivering Sea. What few we sink are not missed- living ships become dead ships quick enough bemired in frigid fog or hunted by dreadnoughts cut from glaciers.” Jon’s grey eyes popped. _He was right,_ Daenerys thought. _They have not neglected the sea._

“We have to get back to Winterfell with all speed.” he said, though Dany suspected he spoke more to himself than any listener.

“That you ought. If they bring their power much further south, you will find the Narrow Sea closed to you.” Matthos intoned.

“Lord Connington will not take this well. His intent is to push onto King-” Daario blurted, heedless of all works spoken out of any mouth but the queen’s.

“There is no reason nor call to molest the capital further. Lord Connington is welcome to come calling while we outfit our fleet for the push on to White Harbor.” Daenerys said.

“I’ll pass it along-”

“Allow me.” Matthos said, departing with a complement of the fish-men. For their part they took in the Essosi with passing glances before their interest dulled, muttering among themselves. _They ought have steel, or at least bronze,_ she thought, _looking at their spears. Driftwood and bone are a poor substitute._

“Perhaps we ought to rouse your northmen, hm?” she asked Jon, keen to move off the beach. _Keener though to get away from the fish-men or the slavers, that’s a question._ He broke from whatever he was going over in his head.

“Oh, right. Hopefully everything went well for Alys.” _Hopefully everything goes well for her child as well,_ Daenerys thought. _The first born in such a time._

A baby’s cry was scarcely a surprise, yet it seemed to change minutely from one moment to the next. Daenerys let Jon lead her through the slight winding passage into the huge hidden chamber, the murals not lost of their majesty even after multiple viewings. Across the way Alys Karstark remained where Jon had laid her. She was still panting, but her breaths were long and steady instead of quick gasps.

“Is everything well, my lady?” Jon called softly so as not to let his voice echo.

“Come, Your Grace, and see for yourself.” came Alys’ answer. Quietly as only a ranger could manage Jon crossed the span of the cave, Dany’s own footsteps elephantine to her ears. _I must get him to show me how he does that,_ she resolved. _I’d like not to be so heavy footed in comparison._ Her self-conscious thoughts died on the vine as she got closer to the huddled group of northmen, Lady Karstark hidden from view. _They are so quiet,_ Dany thought. _I hope all is well._ The baby’s fussing seemed the only sound in the world. Then Dany swallowed. _Either the babe has two mouths or Alys has given birth to twins!_ When the northmen noticed the pair they dutifully made room, Dany too short to go peering over any shoulder higher than Ned Umber’s. She heard Jon’s jaw drop open. In Alys’ arms were twins indeed, each at a breast, and in Sigorn’s was yet another baby at whom he gaped in blank shock. The girl looked as though she’d been through a hurricane, yet she couldn’t seem to keep a furtive smile off her face.

“Well, now we know what happens when you match a northern girl and a wildling.” Jon finally got out, earning a quiet “Har!” from Tormund Giantsbane and the quietest giggle from Alys.

“If my Thenn will stop gaping, maybe he’d like to introduce our eldest daughter to the fold.” Her voice made the big man blink.

“Aynikka, after my own mum. I told Alys it was bad luck, that she died bearing my father a stillborn daughter, that babes ought have milk names first, but-”

“-I’m made of sterner stuff than any Thenn, though it’s plain to see adding some doesn’t hurt.” Alys finished firmly. Sigorn gave a reflexive chortle.

“You’re made of sterner stuff than any _man,_ or giant or dragon or Other for that matter.”

“The kind that goes well with a bit of Thenn. Mmm, maybe more than a bit…” Sigorn blushed beet red while Tormund laughed aloud in spite of his efforts at silence.

“And them?” Jon asked, nodding to the two she held.

“Hmm. Sigorn likes Harra and Torrha, after my…well, they’re Karstark names.” _Three girls! Then again, what do the Free Folk care? Indeed, Sigorn wanted a daughter rather than a son. Well, prayer answered. Perhaps each by a different god._ The Dothraki saw girls as a disappointment from the start, by the very fact that they were not boys and would not grow into fierce warriors. True to his earlier wish, Sigorn looked utterly besotted with the tiny bundle he bore in his great arms. Dany dared not voice the thought that next came to mind. _I wonder what the likelihood is that all five of them survive what is coming._

After ascertaining that Lady Karstark and her newborns were well in hand, Jeyne Poole dutifully helping the new mother at every opportunity, Jon withdrew from the circle, Dany quickly following.

“I hope Sigorn is stronger than he credits himself.” Jon said grimly.

“Why do you say that? Surely the gods that saw fit to send three babes at once will proof the parents against any harm.”

“I didn’t mean that way. I saw what havoc two daughters of different age and temperament wreaked on my father and his lady wife. Imagine the chaos those three will wreak with so formidable a mother and all the north to dash about and cause mischief in.” Dany blinked. _Oh._ Then she giggled.

“They have names befitting their homeland, despite being born on Dragonstone. No storm here to cause their mother grief, either.”

“Not the kind with lightning and wind, anyway. An exile from the east with an army-”

“Jon, _I_ have an army. _You_ have an army, if far to the north. The remaining lords of Westeros together, even, could match and overcome pirates and slavers-turned-sellsword without either of our aid. Out of their own mouths our guests confess that this Prince Aegon’s so-called _‘army’_ is naught but those fleeing a dying land.”

“He is still your kin, if they are to be believed.”

“If he is Rhaegar’s son, then I suppose I’d be a fool not to at least meet him.” she replied neutrally.

“Do you not believe he is who they claim?”

“Say rather it is in my mind how easily a baby with the right look can be believed to be a Targaryen.” _Say also that I’m reluctant to tell this man and all his supporters they came for naught, in the end. That the dragons have flown beyond the sight of men and if they are still alive, are up to their own devices._ She wrapped her arms around herself. Jon mistook it for just the cold and slipped his own around her shoulders. She lay her head on his as they departed the cave, the air tinged only with the salty scent of the sea. Good, they’ve gone. At least for now. Jon took his leave of her once she’d warmed, favoring her with a kiss on her cheek and stealing a giggle. _Off to see the lords to it,_ she surmised. Once the King in the North had left the Unsullied resumed their positions around her and she found herself heading back toward the ever-growing party of Essosi. “If Prince Aegon will not come ashore, I am happy to go to him.” she declared, eyes on Daario Naharis.

“At once, Your Grace.” he replied, one of the boats they’d landed in brought to shore so she could step in without getting wet. _Jon may think me foolish for not waiting for him, but he has the lords of Westeros to herd and hurry along. Surely, I can deal with one purported prince._

The waters got fearful looks from the oarsmen, but Daenerys’ gaze was affixed on the ship in the distance, the magnificent dromond that had a wooden dragon’s head at its prow and a Targaryen banner flying above the off-white sails. _His is different, if only just,_ she thought. _Only someone who’s spent their life looking at the proper thing would know, though._ Their pace was not so quick as she’d have liked, either.

“They are scarce about to pop out of the water to bother with us. You may put your worries aside and dip your oars faster.” she said in curt Valyrian. Her chastising got a bit more speed from the muttering oarsmen. On reaching the ship Daenerys read the word _Fortune_ painted on the rear. _Not a Targaryen word. Not_ Fire and Blood. _Then again, neither am I. Not wholly._ A rope ladder was lowered. Daario moved to help her but Daenerys countermanded him. “I’m not so unable as to quake before a climb.” With that she ascended, breathing hard even through the simple effort. _If Jon Snow can scale a sheer wall of razor rock, I can climb a bloody rope!_ Her hand found the deck’s rail and she pulled herself up, one leg and then the other. Then she was standing on _Fortune’s_ deck, a bit out of breath as she took in those already aboard. Some of them were Westerosi, of that Dany had no doubt. Dispossessed, she thought. Exiled, come to claim their own. There was a beautiful girl of Dornish cast, the only person seated, taking Dany in behind a sphinx’s unreadable face. A boy who looked as much like Gendry as a stag did a bull, too, and the ever-smirking face of Petyr Baelish.

“Your Grace.” A big man with red eyebrows and red hair going grey, clashing griffins on his surcoat stepped to the fore. At once he knelt. For a moment Dany wondered if his sabaton had come unfixed. _Oh. Kneeling. I’d forgotten about that._ The Free Folk did not kneel any more than the Dothraki did, and the rest of Westeros was pleased pink to follow the savages’ example.

“Stand, ser.” _He is a knight, of that I’m certain. He acts too much like Ser Barristan not to be._ He rose, evidently overcome by the moment. The Dornish girl had to mutter something and one of the other knights gently jostle him to get him speaking again.

“I have the honor to be Ser Jon Connington, rightful Lord of Griffin’s Roost and by His Grace’s warrant, Hand of the King.” He turned to his companions. “With us are Arianne Martell, Princess of Dorne and Wyatt Sunglass, Lord of Sweetport Sound, among others.” _Others is right,_ Daenerys could not help thinking. _If you seek to buy the stormlanders’ loyalty with a bastard of Robert Baratheon’s, you’ll find them too wealthy now to tempt with coin so poorly minted._ The doors to the captain’s cabin opened and out came yet another knight, a tall man with a common face. He was followed by an altogether different sort of man, (a _boy,_ Daenerys thought before she could stop herself) one who carried himself upright and unhurried as was so common among the common-born, no matter the continent. He was fair, he was graceful, and his cropped hair was of a shade with Daenerys’ own. On seeing her he stopped in his tracks, evidently thinking hard on what to say.

“Apologies if you were waiting long, Daenerys. I spent the entire voyage getting that damned blue dye out of my hair.” he said almost sheepishly.


	5. Sansa I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sansa reunites with someone.

To her surprise, Sansa found herself waking in the bed she’d fallen asleep in. _No dreams,_ she thought. _I wonder if that’s good or bad._ Quickly she flitted behind Myranda’s unblinking eyes, making sure the Singers’ new roots were in place and the Other himself quite unable to manage another escape. _He hasn’t Howling Wind’s talents._ Then again, men did not share all the same knacks. _I can no more climb than Bran can sew._ She got up, heedless of the flurry that blew in through her open window. _Drat,_ she though crossly. _I must remember to close the window or I’m like to wake up to everything coated in white every morning._ Then she blinked. Outside was black but for the pinpricks of light, torches burning where they could in the yard below or the far ramparts. _Still dark,_ she thought confusedly. Her ears registered a constant stamp of feet, people running about all over the castle. Her sleepy, placid mood vanished and she dressed as quickly as she could, pulling on a thick wool cloak more for show than comfort. _At least I need not hog all the hot water anymore,_ she thought. It gave the others pause in Winterfell when she wore only a summer gown while freezing gales raged most every day though, so she wore the cloak. As innocuously as she could she lastly took her walnut branch in hand, the pack of hounds up and ready when she was. Again, she wished it were Lady at her side instead of mundane dogs. _It is no fault of theirs,_ she thought, feeling guilty. Nobody paid her much mind in the corridors with her hair hidden by the hood but on reaching the hall the skull-capped branch gave her away and the guards let her pass unbothered. Lord Royce sat pale-faced at one of the tables, several of his knights closely attending him. On seeing her he made to stand but seemed curiously unable. In armor, anyway. He’s too old to fight, but not to think or plan.

“What’s happened?” she asked. He took several shallow breaths before replying.

“Apologies, Princess Sansa. The aspect of another battle…it has me off my feet for the moment.” he said blusteringly. _Playing it off as eagerness for the fight._

“You may find it easier to move without your breastplate, my lord. Wights I hear come in numbers that make armor irrelevant, for the most part. If anything, it will slow you. Dead men do not tire, why cede them more ground?” _Besides, steel will not stop razor ice regardless._ At her words he swallowed, trying to will his legs to carry him.

“Off with it, then. Seven save me but I’d sooner die on my feet than my ass.” One of the older knights guffawed at his lord’s command, helping to remove the breastplate and the rest of the heavier armor. “I may still need to brain somebody, so the gauntlets stay.” Sansa offered her hand and pulled him to his feet, watching a bit of color seep back into his cheeks. “They’re coming from the north, of course.” he said. “Out of the wolfswood.” _The giants,_ Sansa thought at once. _They must be brought behind the ring._

Once she might have run for the ramparts, or the castle’s fastest courier. Instead Sansa reached out for one of the forest’s countless owls and promptly began screeching her head off, the numerous mountain-sized people slowly rousing and peering about. It was a few moments before Sansa realized that even with the owl’s spectacular sight, there was no trace of so much as a dead man’s little finger. _That does not mean they are not near,_ she thought. Of course, the owl could no more coerce the giants than carry them and in due course her screeching got the mammoths out of sorts. _That_ made the giants focus. Then Sansa got an idea. She flitted from branch to branch until she found the right mammoth, a hoary old cow that eyed the owl irritably. On reaching for the mammoth something altogether different happened even than with the black hound. Rather than picking a fruit, it was quite as if a hand had popped from the boughs and gripped her own in turn. _Danger,_ she thought, images of a tide of dead men making the cow snort in alarm. She got to her feet, trumpeted, and trundled off at once, the others of her kind quick to follow her lead. _The giants will come now,_ Sansa thought. _They will follow the mammoths anywhere._ There was a fair bit of irate chatter in the Old Tongue and the astonishingly loud wail of an unseen infant, but nobody was left behind, to Sansa’s relief. _Perhaps it would do well to bring Myranda up out of the crypts._ Once the giants were well underway she returned to the waking world, finding herself in the arms of a seated Harrold Arryn.

“Sansa, if you’re going to get up to your northern nonsense the least you could do is sit down first.” he said, red from embarrassment and from admonishing her. _He’s quite right,_ Sansa reminded herself. _I am not invulnerable spirit; I have a body still to mind._ He eased her to her feet. “Where did you go?”

“Out to the wolfswood to warn the giants. To get them out of harm’s way.” Harry swallowed.

“Good thinking. Still, it wouldn’t have been good to have your head dashed open on Winterfell’s own floor from a fall. Shall we find your brother?” _Yes, Jon will know what to do._ Then she remembered Jon was a world away.

“I suppose so. Better that than reeling in the hall less than useless.” she said, shaking herself. Another moment and she was ready to go, heading for the ramparts and finding the others there. While most everyone from the north proper as well as the Vale stared into the darkness, Bran wasted no time in bringing Sansa up to speed.

“The Wall has fallen. What members of the Night’s Watch survived both that and the journey south have only just reached us.” His face was grim but set. Sansa blinked.

“What about Last Hearth?”

“Either whatever in particular’s out there stayed off the kingsroad, going through mountains and forests, or the castle was removed as an obstacle before they could send warning.” _Are they so close?_

“Have we heard anything from the other northern houses?”

“Apart from those here in person, Princess, not a word.” Howland Reed said, appearing from the midst of several of his crannogmen. _Not a word from the enemy, either. One would think the wights would attack straightaway with the giants headed out of reach._ Then bluish light bright as day broke from every horizon from the north and the ground rumbled quietly, pebbles shaking loose from Winterfell’s walls.

“What is _that?”_ Bran shouted, Lord Reed watching with an older man’s composed air. _Thunder,_ Sansa answered in her head. _Thunder from the ground._

Whatever it was moved off after a few minutes, the tempests receding and sending the castle into darkness once again.

“Well… _pretty,_ but whatever that was supposed to be-” Bran said uncertainly.

“It wasn’t for us. They were trying to hit something else, some _one_ else.” Lord Howland replied. He turned finally to the north. “They must be trying to cut the castle off from the countryside. Isolating it before they let the wights at us.” He cracked his fingers. “We’d best get the rings built sooner rather than later. We’ll need to work at night, I think, in torchlight if they’ll stay lit.”

“That’s not like to please the giants.” Sansa said doubtfully.

“Neither will such a tempest loosed upon their heads.” Howland replied grimly. Dutifully, several fluent speakers of the Old Tongue were dredged up and informed of their task. Their faced advertised their eagerness to perform such a task.

“I’ll go as well. What giants speak the Common Tongue may do better putting our words in terms more easily swallowed.” Sansa said, her wariness of the big folk put quite in perspective by what else she’d seen of late. Nobody objected, mostly because Sansa suspected their minds were on whatever had happened just over the horizon. _Doubtless we’ll find out when the Others feel ready to throw it at Winterfell proper._ She put the blinding lights and shaking ground out of her mind, intent on making certain of the giants’ continued well-being. _Jon would do the same._ _He’s not here and Bran is busy with the Singers and with Meera and their babe, so the giants fall to me._ What wildlings fluent enough in the Old Tongue and steeled enough to ask more of sleep-deprived giants seemed led by one older man with a bald head who limped along on a wooden peg in place of a foot. _A Thenn,_ Sansa knew at once. They were fluent in the Old Tongue and used to obeying superiors. _Maybe that discipline will rub off on the giants._ Not that they were an unruly lot- if anything, giants were more reserved than men, even shy. _They mind their mammoths and wander about. Precisely nothing like the stories Old Nan used to tell Bran._ She made to introduce herself to the Thenn but he only looked at her.

“Know you are.” he said curtly. “Firehair.” He pointed to her branch. _Perhaps they believe it improper to talk to me, Jon’s sister? Or are they afraid of me?_ She didn’t see fear in the bald man’s face, though. _No doubt they talk of me in their own circles. To the Valemen I’m simply Princess Sansa, but what am I to the Free Folk? Or the giants, for that matter?_ They walked out to the outer ring together, the other half-dozen wildlings giving them a wide berth. _My talkative escort must be someone of ill repute._ When she turned to look at them, she saw they were Thenns all but a single filthy boy who might have been of the ice-river clans. At once they stopped, every pair of eyes on her. _Wary, yes, but not of the old Thenn._

“Is something wrong?” she asked finally. The boy’s hanging jaw and wide eyes told her he at least spoke not a word of the Common Tongue.

“No talk. Near _gond.”_ A familiar terse voice said. _Not_ so _near. I’ll need Val to explain this, she may be more helpful._ The others had torches, but Sansa needed none to see the bunches of prostrate forms looming out of the night. One giant slowly rubbed his eyes with his fists. Something came trundling toward them from behind a motionless mammoth, making funny piping noises. The Thenns froze while Sansa smiled at the sight of the baby, its little trunk coming up to rub her side. A louder heavier snuffling from the mother turned several giants’ heads immediately and one of them came forward to spur the baby back toward her. When the giant saw Sansa he froze in turn, the mud-brown eyes, primitive square face and shaggy black hair clear to her even in the darkness and the falling snow.

 _“Baelfea.”_ he grunted quietly. _I’ve heard that word from them before,_ she thought. A look to the Thenn confirmed her suspicion. _“_

 _Baelfea.”_ he reiterated. “Old Tongue. Firehair.” Sansa stood there, still and silent. So did the others, despite the cold and the snow. _I’m sure I’ve been called worse behind my back in King’s Landing,_ Sansa thought. _I’d rather be Baelfea than a little dove. Or a little bird, for that matter. But would I rather be Baelfea than Sansa Stark?_

“The dead are near. The earthen rings must be completed sooner than planned. I’m afraid work will need to be done at night to make this possible.” Sansa said, the Thenn translating. She saw the giant’s nostrils flare, his unkempt beard fluttering with the force of his exasperated breath. He answered in the Old Tongue.

“Torr say saw big light. Felt ground shake. Firehair want dirt faster, so do Torr.” _Primitive to a southerner, but not ignorant by any means._

“Do you know what it was?” she asked. _It turned out the Singers are a deal more like the Others than they care to admit or have shoved in their faces. Do the giants know more of our enemy as well than anyone’s bothered to ask?_ Torr peered into his hands.

“Men not like _gond,_ like _nagran._ Men live small.” He ran his tongue over his huge dark teeth. “Live small, only time to think small thinks. World _big._ World _old._ Big life in it still, life men live too small to see. Big life far away. Far above, far below.” Sansa blinked.

“The Singers say just the opposite. They’re afraid that the world of men will overtake the one that came before.” At this, Torr laughed aloud, shaking his great head in utter bemusement. Sansa actually saw a tear roll out of one of his dark crinkled eyes to freeze in his beard. _“_

 _Na_ _gran_ often sad. Often weepy. Sad it not stay summer all times, sad all green must go to brown, to grey, to white. _Gond_ say, _Nagran_ must have rocks in head. Think same thinks since beginning. Never different. Different, _any_ different, make _Nagran_ sad.” _And some claim the giants simple. It’s words they lack, not thoughts._ Sansa found herself quite in agreement with the giant’s words, even through the Thenn. _If Branch would stop weeping over things long past and bother to look the present in the face he may find, miracle of miracles, something to approve of. Perhaps that’s the problem with using the trees, at least the way the Singers use them. It ties one to the past the more the generations roll by._ She spotted other giants and their mammoths moving back toward the northern section of the ring. Sansa followed, intent on making sure the giants were at least working without a horde of wights trying to get at them. Thankfully the great blocks’ cutting and raising had been done in the weeks prior, leaving the moat to stop the wights simply rushing the walls except by one narrow bit the giants used as a bridge to reach the wolfswood. That same block they began to pull up once Torr spread the news that the forest was likely overrun. Only once it had been put into place did Sansa realize that with the outer ring’s completion Winterfell had become an island. _One about to bear the brunt of a storm the likes of which have not been seen since the Dawn._ She wondered whether the mountain clans, so leery of wildlings, would be so prickly if they saw what might well be passing through their ancestral lands just then. _A spearwife or an Other. Val or Howling Wind._ A choice everyone in Winterfell had made, their decision advertised by their presence. _If only the Others had been more rambunctious when Father was alive. Perhaps the situation would not have got so out of hand._ On the way back to the castle she gave it more thought. _King Robert was too drunk to see what a blind man could, and Father, bless him, was not the man to check the Others. Jon is his true heir, not me or Bran or even Robb, but Jon can look forward, a trait rare in northmen._

She was quite lost in thought when she caught sight of Brienne of Tarth’s blue armor. The tall woman looked almost embarrassed, her face a deep red. For a breath Sansa thought it was because of the man she was talking with, a bit taller even than she. Then Sansa saw the burned face, the puckered hairline, and recognized the curt gravelly voice. Bran, Jon and even Howling Wind fled her mind. Then at Brienne’s noticing of her the man turned. Sandor Clegane was missing an ear and his face was even more haggard than it had been the night of the Blackwater, where hellish green light had turned him from frightening to nightmarish. _He’s not so scary as I remember,_ Sansa thought. _Nor so imposing. Then again, it’s hard to think of a man as imposing when one has seen a giant join battle._ If anything, the man looked terribly tired. _I wonder where he went after the battle. What sort of road brought him back to Winterfell._ She gulped, feeling suddenly self-conscious regarding her wild hair to say nothing of the walnut branch she held, and made her way through the ever-present throng of crannogmen. He looked as stunned as she felt, either unable or unwilling to move as she got closer.

“I didn’t think the world could do you any more harm.”

“Neither did I. Then along came a bitey blue bitch.” he replied, color rising in Brienne’s cheeks. _No knight,_ Sansa remembered. _Not the man she thinks on so often._

“What was the issue?”

“Your sister. Me and her were on the road, nowhere to go and nowhere to be, when-”

“Pod and I chanced across them. By the time we’d settled our differences, Arya had disappeared-”

“-we got into it, she fucking _bit_ me, baying like a hunting hound-”

“-I was _not-”_

“-end of it all, I was lying on the valley floor with a broken leg, a mouthful of blood and nothing left. But one thing led to another-”

“-and here you are.” Sansa finished. Brienne was still bristling, so Sansa turned to her. _I had forgotten about Podrick Payne anyway. Maybe he’s been keeping his head down seeing as it was his own blood that killed Lord Stark._ “Speaking of young Podrick, perhaps you should make certain he’s staying out of trouble, Brienne. This man and I have much to discuss, and I’d sooner do it where you needn’t feel the urge to defend me.” The blue beauty pursed her lips, looking hurt in her way. “You kept my mother safe. Don’t think I don’t want you here, Brienne.” Her feelings were hard to put in words. _She is a noble-minded daughter of the Seven. Of the south. What could she, blessed as she must be, know of the real world? Of wood and stone and ice and bone?_ “I just think this man is more fitted to what I want to say just now.” She turned to the man who had once been the Hound. “Even with all our worthy visitors, there are empty rooms aplenty in Winterfell. Full barrels, too. It would please me for you to stay in the castle instead of one of the inns in the winter town. It has only recently been rebuilt, and buildings are still going up notwithstanding the war-”

“-if there’s building to be done, strong backs ought be doing it. I don’t need some cushy hearth-lit room.” Sandor Clegane told her. _I might tell him he’s highborn, after a fashion. I might order it of him. That’s what Sansa the Little Bird would do. Sansa the Lady. Not_ Baelfea, _with Ramsay’s whore on strings, Ramsay’s hounds in tow and Ramsay’s skull in hand._

“Nobody will look too hard at a man who can do the work of two, perhaps three.” she said. “The smallfolk keep to their own business. Indeed, with the coming of the crannogmen they’re even more reluctant to come into the castle than during the peaceful years. One inn or other will have risen up against the walls by now.” All she got in reply was a short nod.

It was a small matter of pulling the skull off the branch and holding it in her off hand beneath her cloak, her red hair hidden by a hood. The same provision had been made for Sandor Clegane’s face. The smallfolk of the yet-named inn were gathered tight around several tables that looked fashioned from warped or rubbish wood. _It will be a painful few years, until all the splinters have been worn away. Even then, the tables will never sit even._ After she slid a silver stag at him, he duly looked at the coin rather harder than their faces.

“Room or two upstairs. Breakfast an hour after first light. Stay as long as you please.” he said amicably, immediately turning his back to them. Once thus lodged, Sansa removed her hood and deftly recapped the walnut branch. All the while, Sandor Clegane watched from the door, only speaking when she looked at him.

“I’d light the hearth, but you don’t seem chilled.”

“I’m not. And you hate fire anyway.” _All it does is burn and blind._ She sat down at the room’s little table, another wobbly woebegone thing. Slowly he sat down across from her.

“It’s my knee,” he said, “I felt it twist in the mad rush from the Wall. Hasn’t been right since.”

“I had no idea you were swift as a flying falcon, Sandor.” Sansa asked. The puckered grimace that had become his face twisted in something like worry.

“I was on my own from the off. Never did catch a glimpse of…them once I’d gotten off the Wall. I’d just found Stranger again, I wasn’t going to lose him to anyone, living or dead.” Sansa felt a little flutter in her heart. That the horse had survived to reunite with his master pleased her greatly. Then her elation was tempered by uncertainty.

“Stranger’s no common plow horse, but…”

“Even a warhorse isn’t about to outrun a blizzard.” Sandor finished, nodding. “Well, all told, he didn’t. He just kept running, right on through it. Even when the winds were stripping branches off trees and throwing men around, I never left the saddle.” Sansa’s eyebrows arched.

“Small wonder you reached the champion’s circle at the Hand’s tourney.”

“Hang champions, hang tourneys. Stranger holds onto _me,_ not the other way ‘round.” Even after Howling Wind and all the rest, Sansa found it in her to be surprised.

“You might have said something earlier.”

“It’s not my tale to tell. Stranger’s business is his own.” Sandor said stiffly.

“Where is he now?”

“Someplace. Close, probably. But not where one of your fool sers will spot him and try something.”

“He must _eat…”_ “When there’s food, and only if he remembers.” That made no sense to Sansa, but it was far from her chief concern. “Besides, I’m keener to know just what happened to the little bird I left trapped in a sea of green flame.”

Where to start? While Sandor slowly sipped ale from a dented tankard, Sansa told him of all that had transpired since their last meeting. From being set aside by Joffrey in favor of Margaery to being married to Tyrion to being brutalized by Ramsay. To her surprise telling Sandor that part was easy, even her farce of a wedding night to the Bastard of the Dreadfort. Harder was speaking of her reunion with Jon, of seeing his ascension by the assembled lords’ common assent. Of the nights she’d spent in the Haunted Forest in the body of an ice spider and the lanky brutes that slunk through the tall sentinel pines. Of Howling Wind and the Lords of the Long Night. Sandor never interrupted, never commented, just drank and listened; his eyes locked on her face. At the mention of the name _Baelfea_ and what it meant, he stopped drinking. She’d talked more in the last hour than she had in the last year, and when her words stopped, she felt exhausted.

“You’re not a little bird any longer.” Sandor said. _No. I’m an ice spider, glutted in her hollow beneath a fallen tree. I’m a bloom of winter roses growing over lion bones. I’m a white owl with blue eyes, on an arm clad in icy silk. I’m Lady, wherever she is._ “One morning, a few days after the Red Wedding…your sister told me she saw your mother dead in the river. In a dream.”

“Did you believe her?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“You don’t strike me as the…well, as the type to set stock in such things.”

“After Stranger, it’s not so hard to imagine. Certainly, I’m no clinking grey rat who thinks all that goes on in this world can be put on paper.” Sansa found a smile curl her lips.

“It’s not every man who would take kindly to learning that the person across from him made a corpse walk.”

“Worse things have been done by worse men. Meat and bone, that’s all we are. If you’ve put some to use before your enemy could, what’s to piss my breeches about?” _Ahoooooo. Ahoooooo. Ahoooooo._ The trumpet’s blaring shook Sansa from her thoughts. _One of the sentries on the parapets._

“It’s them. The Others.” she told Sandor. “Perhaps their dead men have finally been sighted.”

“Good.” he replied, standing. “It’s been too long since I’ve fought somebody. Let’s get you back to the castle first, though.” At her frown he shrugged. “It isn’t for your safety. I want a crack at them before you figure out how to make them crumble to the last corpse or burst into flame or some such fuckery.”

Out on the ramparts the winds were steadily picking up.

“When will they come?” one guardsman asked, wrapped in a blanket and shrugging off snow. Several dirty looks made him turn red. “Just putting it out there. All this time waiting for them, now they’re right outside-”

“Barnard, do us all a favor and shut your fucking mouth.” the sergeant on duty muttered. _One of the stormlanders,_ Sansa remembered. What few of them had survived from Dragonstone to waiting on the wights had become flinty as any true northmen, the sergeant in particular with his long beard and steely eyes. _They follow Davos Seaworth now, or would if he were here._ The day’s fleeting light was already fast fading, the sun dipping into the west. _It’s getting harder to keep track of time. The days are shorter than normal days, the nights longer than normal nights._

“What good are we here? We ought be out at the dirt wall where we can see them, get at them.” Sandor said grumpily.

“Let’s see what they do first. They have three such earthen walls to scale, not to mention the moats before them, before they reach the winter town and the castle proper. Why throw ourselves into their midst just for the fight?” Sansa asked in reply. _All according to Lord Howland’s stratagem, she thought. Lizard-lions rarely chase their food, they spring from the bogs in ambush. They know food enough will come to them, as Lord Howland knows fight enough will come to him._ The last glint of sunlight vanished, and night began to fall. At once Sansa could hear the wolfswood come alive. _As such, anyway._ The sound of countless rushing feet reminded her of the Battle of the Bastards- if there were ten times as many men fighting it and they’d all been rendered mute beforehand. _No trumpets, no calls to arms, no cries of valor._ The combination was truly unnerving. Instantly she spotted men readying to go out to the wall if needed, if the garrison was not enough. Several giants were plodding out to the outermost ring as well, determination in their faces. _I wonder if this is the start of it,_ Sansa thought. _If this northern push is their first action, or if they’ve found a way to cause trouble other places as well._ For the first time in a long time, Sansa felt herself go cold. _The war is starting and here we are, no dragons, no second army, and no King in the North._ The defenders’ shouts of “Moat!” were met by a mass mobilization by the crannogmen, the olive tide pouring out of the castle and the hollow bits of ring to reinforce the contested bit of wall. As the sounds of battle joined and grew louder, Sansa braced for the worst. There were screams, shouts of pain and terror, but nothing so horrible as she imagined. _Could it be the wights are stymied by the moat? That they lack the ability to scale the wall quick enough to present a true threat?_ It had only been a thought, the earthen rings, but it seemed as the moments became minutes and the garrison held that Sansa’s simple idea had quite proved worth doing. A moment more and Bran was beside her, Meera as well, her smoky sword prominent on her hip.

“Just wights for now.” Sansa said.

“For now.” Branch’s sullen voice replied, coming up the stone steps. “Maggots may reach the corpse first, but that doesn’t dull a wolf’s interest. Nor a shadowcat’s, nor a bear’s.” _Ever cheerful._ There was only the faintest sound of cured leather boots fast approaching, even to Sansa’s ears. Only she and Branch turned to see who was about to be on them and for a moment Sansa felt irritation at glimpsing Myranda. _Is it my worry that draws her?_ The eyes were different though, not the green that Sansa had put into them. _Blue. Blue like stars._ The dead girl did not shamble along as the wights had in the Haunted Forest, nor did she pay anyone else the slightest mind. Sansa had time only to raise her arm in defense before Myranda tackled her- or rather, whatever had taken ahold of her strings bid her to. Even when Meera put her sword through the corpse’s back her feral rending hands did not still. A foot away, an inch, and Sansa recognized the eyes that stared out from Myranda’s face. _Walls of glass,_ she remembered as a pair of cold hands shoved her arm aside and clasped around her throat. Or tried to. Instead, Sansa’s palm caught her in the ribs. The walls of glass went wide, the mouth dropped open, and Myranda flew from the ramparts as she’d done when Theon had killed her. While chaos reigned on the ramparts and Bran frantically tried to tend to Sansa, she could not tear her eyes away from the hand that had struck Myranda. There was nothing to denote anything out of the ordinary, but Sansa felt it tingle, felt it _hum._ Only after he realized she was unharmed did Bran pick up on it as well. Eventually the feeling faded until her arm felt like a wet cloth, like she’d bumped her elbow on something especially hard, but the memory of what had been was crisp and clear in her mind.

“Like I said,” the rough voice of Sandor Clegane said softly as he brought her to her feet, “Save some for the rest of us. Else your bastard brother will come back to Winterfell with you having won his war for him.”


	6. Samwell I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Samwell helps the lords of the Reach organize and gets news from Gilly.

Gilly spent the evening looking over the various dresses in the townhouse they were quartered in.

“I’m not going to keep any,” she said, “the people who live here will likely be back one day and they should find everything as it was.” Sam murmured in agreement, lying on the bed with his eyes on the ceiling. Vaguely he could hear Little Sam giggling, likely hidden under the bed. His whole world was in the room with him and yet Sam’s thoughts could not be further away from them. Over and over he saw the dragon crashing through the ceiling of the Red Keep, scales glittering like black opals and snorting smoke. _Turning steel into sap._ Sam swallowed, trying keep his thoughts settled. _If that dragon had been at the Fist, he would have done for all the wights, the White Walkers, and the Others as well. Torches and pitfires might die in their presence, but this is something else._ The black flame had surged with tremendous force from the mouth that loosed it, sure as a loosed arrow. _Or more aptly, a scorpion bolt. Or a giant’s thrown boulder._ Even if it took longer to end an Other than their chattel, Sam didn’t see how something could withstand such overwhelming force. _There are two more as well,_ he reminded himself. _Somewhere. Perhaps they’re mixing it up with the dead right this moment._ An odd feeling bubbled in Sam’s chest, making his hands tremble over his chest. _Perhaps this is what hope feels like._ After so many years dreading the prospect of the Others, Sam found himself contemplating if even they had their limits. What had it taken to kill the dragons of the past? Another dragon, or a scorpion bolt in the eye. _Or an entire chain of fire-mountains erupting at once. One trick I’m confident the Others will not play on us._ Once more in his mind’s eye a torrent of black flame surged out and iron screamed, bubbling in moments. _If they can do that to iron, imagine what they can do to ice._ Jon had been too preoccupied with Daenerys Targaryen to confer with after the throne room but on the way to the townhouse Sam heard lords great and small talking as soon as the pair were out of earshot.

“Seven save me, I never thought I’d see a _lizard.”_

“I often thought about them when I was a lad, but I didn’t imagine them so alive.”

“Those red eyes…he was looking at us just the same as we were at him. There were thoughts going on in there…”

“Fucking terrifying.”

“To think they were used in wars over the throne. The Field of Fire…who can say it was any sort of battle _now?” Precisely,_ Same had thought. Only then did he realize Gilly’s chatter had died. He looked to her and she was giving him the same reproachful look she always did when he tried to spare her discomfort or uncertainty.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. _Maybe she’s got the dragon on the mind as well, passing it off for Little Sam’s benefit._

“Sam, you’re not the only one who can work out a dragon would do for the dead.” There was fear in her eyes, but not the kind he saw on his family’s face in the throne room. She understands what a boon the dragons may well be. If not a blessing.

“I didn’t want to dwell on it and make you worry.” Gilly’s mouth tightened. “I’ve had a White Walker come grabbing at Little Sam. Talk isn’t going to scare me.”

“Well, obviously you know what them being here means. The other lords-”

“-haven’t seen half of what we have. They’ll come ‘round when the dead men come. If not then, when the black fire lays them low.” she said, picking Little Sam up. He beamed at the sight of Samwell.

“HA!” he laughed aloud, reaching eagerly. Smiling himself, Sam took the lad in his arms.

In the sitting room Sam found House Tarly proper eating fish for supper. Hardly surprising. _There’s naught else to eat in King’s Landing but what Dragonstone’s got coming in- or rather, what the man-fishes do._ Despite their quite terrifying appearance, on closer examination the man-fishes didn’t seem to do much more than wander around on the beach waiting for leave to go back to sea. _They can come up, but that may be more accident than design._ Surely, Sam figured, they could make quite a mess of things if they chose, but until lately he’d heard no more than fishing stories of such creatures. _The Citadel’s wisdom seems less wise by the day._ Sam frowned. He wore no chain, yet he could close a wound well as any maester and write better than most of them as well. _All the better to show the rest a lord who can put his own name to paper,_ he thought dryly. _As well as one who isn’t afraid of something greater than himself._ The looks he got were mixed. His mother’s smile was warm as ever he remembered and Talla seemed pleased enough to see him, but Dickon looked uncertain. Lord Randyll looked as sour as ever. _Nice to see you too, Father._ In front of father and son was a jug and two wooden cups, likely rougher fare than they drank out of at Horn Hill. _Boo hoo,_ thought Samwell as he took not a cup but the tankard, face falling at the half-full weight. He emptied it in one long draught, setting it down afterward.

“Northmen like to drink.” Sam said, shrugging at his family’s astonished looked. _I may have drunk more than I can hold, but better that than be too afraid to taste a sip._ He turned to his brother. “Don’t get drawn into a drinking contest at Winterfell, Dickon. It isn’t worth waking up two days later with bloody knuckles, no shirt and a broken nose.” He moved to the door. “If you want Heartsbane, it’s in my room. Just know you’re not going to kill an Other with it in anything remotely resembling a fair fight.” Sam added without turning around. Stepping out into the night, Sam could hear what people remained to King’s Landing go about their business. _All this tumult among the lords and they couldn’t care less._ He wasn’t altogether surprised to see other banners from the Reach hanging from balconies or out of windows of the other townhouses and inns on the street. _No doubt we’ve split by realm a cleanly as on a map. The Seven Kingdoms only exist for the privileged. For the vast majority, it’s just Westeros._ He chuckled humorlessly at seeing the half-dozen buildings claimed by the red apple of Cider Hall and all its offshoots. _House Fossoway can’t piss itself without arguing who’s in charge. I’ll bet the man I found at Highgarden has already lost his house’s support._ He found himself making his way over to the larger of the inns flying the red-apple banner, hearing arguing inside as he thought he might. Before he could think, he found himself hammering on the door with a fist. At once it opened and he had to stop short of punching a Fossoway retainer squarely in the face. Sam stolidly shouldered past while the man spluttered, finding the Fossoways themselves red in the face and almost at blows in the sitting room while the hapless proprietor looked on. _Taste of Glory,_ Sam thought. _Foss’ Folly, more like._

Hard to miss as he was, it took a few moments for them to realize someone had arrived. Gradually, silence fell.

“Don’t let me interrupt you.” he said, arms at his sides and hands again balled into fists. Several people made to come forward at once, prompting the fighting to start again but it stopped as soon as it began when they saw Sam’s expression. This isn’t going to work. _No more Tyrells, no more throne and still they fight. Over Cider Hall just as they fight with the other lords over Highgarden._ “It strikes me that certain matters must needs be resolved before we sail north.” He thought for a moment. “The Dragonpit has room for everyone. We will fill it with the Lords of the Reach and settle affairs in stone, with no ambiguity.” His words were calm, even disinterested, but Sam had to work hard to hide his anger. “If you lot could collect yourselves and proceed with even a modicum of dignity, I’d appreciate it.” _Not hard enough,_ he thought.

“Who, in particular? We can’t agree on who-” one knight asked.

“Everybody.” Sam replied. “Every single Fossoway there is to be found. Your green cousins, too. No one will claim absentia, nor abstention.” He visited each other cluster of banners. Grapes, towers, horns-of-plenty and all the rest were invited to a council in the Dragonpit. _I suppose they will make the wrong decision, as they most always seem to do._ He saved the townhouse the Tarlys were quartered in for last. “The others are heading to the Dragonpit of all places. I suppose they want to puzzle out what problems remain somewhat in arrears.” he told Lord Randyll. As he suspected, the man’s mouth became a tight white line.

“Who summons us?”

“I don’t know. Outside I saw people heading that way and was bright enough to inquire what was going on. If you want to present yourself as a candidate for Highgarden, you’d best get your family moving.” Lord Randyll had his wife and children out of the house inside five minutes, off no doubt to bang his empty head against the wall. Wearily, Sam headed back upstairs, careful not to wake Gilly and Little Sam should they be asleep. He was half right, finding the lad dozing in a bundle of blankets while Gilly watched the lords and their retainers head for the Dragonpit.

“Where are they all going?” she asked at once.

“To pull their heads out of their asses and shove them up each other’s.” Sam replied, drawing a reactive giggle from Gilly before her look became reproachful again.

“Is it the red-apple people?”

“The red-apple people arguing who’s reddest, and everyone in general over that castle we found them at.” Gilly frowned.

“Apples are apples. Red, green, yellow, each will fill your belly full as the other.”

“Tell them that.” She was quiet for a little while.

“They’d not listen to me, Sam. But maybe they will to someone else.”

“I don’t think there _is_ anyone else. It will have to be one of them.”

“You should ask the old woman. Old Olenna. See what she says.”

“Olenna Tyrell is more like to poke the bear than let him lie.” Gilly nodded.

“Mhmm. Even if she doesn’t want to go, she surely would for just that reason. She’s got nothing to do but bother people. Let her, Sam.”

With no little amount of trepidation, Sam paid a visit to the old woman. Her huge guardsmen were bleary-eyed and especially ornery but Olenna Redwyne herself seemed surprisingly hale given the late waking.

“Old people don’t sleep, Samwell.” she explained, waving a hand impatiently. “I had only to look out my window and see all manner of goings-on, what have I missed?”

“A council has been called in the Dragonpit, my lady. I suppose it’s to sort out who among the Fossoways is Lord of Cider Hall and who among the Lords of the Reach is Lord of Highgarden proper.” Her face fell slightly. _I suppose it’s the only acknowledgement House Tyrell will get. Another family in their place is the Reach’s way of saying they’re gone._

“Well, that’s all well and good, but the Dragonpit is on the other side of the city and I’m near eighty.”

“Aye, you’re a decrepit old raisin but there’s juice in you yet. Elsewise, you’d not had lived through all you have and all you’ve lost.” Gilly said from behind Sam. To his absolute astonishment Olenna’s wrinkled face brightened at her words.

“You’re still a Redwyne of the Arbor. Your nephew will want to hear your counsel, if no one else will.” Little Sam fussed in Gilly’s arms, peering at Olenna in recognition and pointing with a sleepy smile. _He does like to point at things._ “Even if they wave your words away, everyone of high birth in the Reach will be there. An opportunity to show up and annoy all of them at once. Perhaps your last.” Resolve creeped into the wizened face before him.

“The Queen of Thorns, they call me. I suppose I’d be a fool bigger than your father to miss giving them all a last good prick, eh?” she said, reaching to a nearby little table. On it was a small jug from which she poured a dark Arbor red.

“Your father’s?” Sam asked.

“My grandfather’s.” Sam’s eyebrows went up. _I wonder how much a cask of_ that _costs._ “You can squeeze the wine from the grape, but you cannot squeeze the grape from the wine, he used to say.” she seemed to be talking more to herself than them. _“Ripe and Ready.”_ She snorted humorlessly. To Sam’s surprise, she filled another cup. “The last of the small lake’s worth I took with me when I wed my dear daft Luthor.” she explained, holding it out. “I never told anybody about it, drinking only when I had a child. The years passed and I started doing so too when a Redwyne I knew died. Eventually my children started having children of their own. That seemed more cause than any to tap into a cask. I got so drunk the night Margaery was born…” the ghost of a smile rose and set across her wrinkled mouth. “The day she died, too. The day they all did and left one old woman alone with naught but barrels to witness her grief.” Sam was reminded irresistibly of Maester Aemon, giving voice to the past when he felt his many days at last were numbered. He took the cup from mildly shaking hand. “Ah, forgive me. That wretchedness started perhaps a year ago.” Olenna sounded almost embarrassed.

“It’s no trouble my lady, but I think we’ll need another cup.” She frowned.

“I thought you were intelligent, Samwell. Any fool could tell you that’s a bad idea.” _Can she tell I’ve already had a half-tankard tonight?_

“A headache’s a headache, big or small.” Her eyes flitted from Sam to Gilly and back.

“Headaches come and go, aye, Redwynes know this better than most. What we also know better than most is wine is perhaps the worst thing-” She stopped talking abruptly. Sam turned to Gilly himself and was startled to see her eyes wide and her mouth tight. “Oops.” Olenna said, going red as a wine grape.

He felt numb all over, even as he helped the twin guardsmen find a carriage. Were it not for Erryk catching him once or twice, he’d have certainly fallen over. _Is this how all men feel when they find out? Or am I still Sam the Craven, afraid of my own shadow?_ He found he didn’t care one way or another, too preoccupied with trying to figure out Gilly’s future to worry about being a coward. _It won’t matter if it’s a boy or girl, Father thinks Little Sam is mine and he’s no sooner to disfavoring Dickon than he was when he sent me to the Wall._ That rather set Sam at ease. _One more bastard isn’t like to bother anyone. We’ll be too busy fighting the Others when the time comes for anyone to whine about the Night’s Watch vows._ Still, he had broken them. Not bent, as he’d been doing near as long as he’d been in the Watch but broken them clean and for true. Olenna, astute as ever, noticed Sam struggling with himself.

“Vows are words and words are wind, Samwell Tarly.” she said dismissively, peering expectantly out the carriage window. Arryk drove while Erryk clung to the rear rather deftly for a man so large, in Sam’s opinion. On their arrival at the Dragonpit Sam was dismayed but not altogether surprised when he heard shouting coming from within. _At least they won’t wake the lords of other kingdoms, clucking chickens on full display for all to see,_ Sam thought. As he passed through the crumbling stone halls to the pit proper, he wondered at how far he’d come. _Once, a fat boy’s cruel father sent him off to die._ He was still a jumble of nerves and half-realized thoughts when the voices snapped him from his reverie, as well as quite relieving him of the butterflies in his stomach. _I ought be alone with Gilly and Little Sam just now, not wrangling chickens and wiping noses._ Unlike before, Sam waste no time waiting for someone to notice or acknowledge him. Once Gilly and Olenna had their hands to their ears, Little Sam pressed to Gilly’s chest, Sam put his borrowed trumpet to use. He kept at it until the shouting stopped and he wouldn’t have to yell himself to be heard.

“Is this the measure of the Reach’s power?” he asked, louder than he meant to. “A man without a thought in his head, a basket of spilled apples, some casks of wine? Had I known you lot would shame me so, I’d not have bothered going to Highgarden to rally you in the first place.” No one spoke. No one moved. _They know who I am,_ he thought. Everyone in the Reach had known about fierce Lord Randyll Tarly’s bookish son. “Fruit and flowers it seems are only too fit to be your sigils. Towers too, to lock yourselves into and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist.” _All this because everyone here claims some blood or other in common with Garth Greenhand, a man who may well have not lived at all. Even if he had, he’d have more in common with Gilly than any lord from the Reach._ “Have you at the very barest figured out who’s going to lead the Fossoways?”

“That’s the rub, Samwell.” Paxter Redwyne said after a bit of silence, when it was clear Sam had no more words for them. “We have a lackwit, two babes and an old woman to say nothing of the hale men vying for Cider Hall.” Sam rubbed his eyes. The wine catching up with him, delicious though it had been.

“Very well. The apples argue who is sweetest while the Others wait below for them to start dropping off the branch.” He waved a hand and put them out of his mind. “What about Highgarden? Have you come to a consensus on that point?”

“Your father doesn’t even know what _consensus_ means, Samwell.” Olenna said wryly from his side.

“Nominally, it would be the lord of that selfsame castle who calls his vassals to council. As it stands, we can’t quite work out just who called this one in the first place.” Baelor Hightower said.

“Samwell did, or are you as still and unthinking as your sigil?” Olenna said irritably.  
“He was sick of waiting around for one of you to have the stones to put forth for Highgarden to his face so here we, putting all the burden on your clueless heads.”

Those lords he claimed only to be relaying the message to looked at him.

“I arrived at Highgarden expecting you to be finishing up the petty politics. Instead I found you had yet to even start. We marched to the kingswood and every night’s topic was Highgarden. Still no decision. It was my bright idea to tell Daenerys Targaryen a lord chosen by his peers would make you all happiest. Are we truly so unable to _simply fucking pick someone_ that we must ask another to make the choice for us?” He decided to make no mention of the Others or the events at the Wall for as long as possible. _They are like children. Talk too much of things above their heads and they go crosseyed and wander away._ “It isn’t the dragon’s job to choose for us when by rights we ought choose ourselves. Our affairs are no more her concern than hers are ours.”

“There are a hundred men here with more than little claim to Highgarden, Samwell-” Sam interrupted Paxter before he could finish.

“Then choose another way. Any way. If not by blood, choose by deed. But choose. Claiming kinship to Garth Greenhand won’t stop the Others anyhow, my lords. It won’t stop a nosebleed. I only hope this is a lesson you can learn even so late as now as opposed to later, on the field of battle.” As he suspected, he saw no inklings of understanding, no comprehension in their highborn faces. _Nor will I,_ he thought, _until they see for themselves._ “I suppose I can’t hold it against you. I only learned myself by being made to fight well outside my weight- and I am fat, my lords.” _Though not so fat as I was._ “I got knocked down more than once, by all manner of comers. In the north you’ll have to take getting knocked down as well, my lords. The people, the animals, the cold… there are no harvest banquets that make for songs a hundred years down the line. No fruit on the banners, either. Direwolves and bears, angry giants and lizard-lions, among others, are fitting sigils for the northmen.” More than one face grew pale. _It’s as if the dragon just landed in our midst again._

“I heard they have giants up there. Real ones, not Umbers.” Desmera Redwyne’s voice was silk against the sound of steel on steel.

“So far as I know, Lord Eddard Umber is the last of his house. There were giants in Mance Rayder’s host, and if Jon Snow says they’ve taken up in the north proper, they have. They’re not half so hostile as most wildlings, though. Leave their mammoths alone and they’re content to let you south along, bugs underfoot.” It became steadily harder to keep his eyes open, even in the midst of full conversation. _Too much wine,_ he thought. “But you’re harvesting before you’ve planted. Worry about your petty nonsense once we get up there if you like, just know that there’s no such thing as a second chance. Forget your furs and you will freeze. Lose your horse, the wolves will have it down in minutes.” He slowly turned, fighting to keep his balance. “Just pick a lord paramount and follow him, sure as he would follow the dragon.” He didn’t remember getting back into the carriage, but the hazy image of the roof stuck out even as he felt Gilly lean into him. Little Sam’s sleepy burbling proved harder to shrug off than all the lords of the Reach shouting together, and Sam himself fell asleep then and there.

He woke to snoring so loud his first thought was of Grenn.

“Pyp, give him a kick.” He muttered groggily, only realizing after a few head-clearing blinks that it was Olenna Redwyne snoring so. _Maybe I’m still asleep,_ he thought, before the headache hit and the inside of the carriage spun madly. There was more than Olenna to hear though. He tensed at the sound of multiple pairs of feet walking around outside. _Armored,_ Sam thought. Bracing for the coming pain he opened the carriage door, making Gilly murmur and turn away in protest. He blinked out the sunlight, yawning while the world came into focus. There were men everywhere, in every manner of armor and looking as if they’d come from a dozen different lands. _Sellswords,_ Sam knew at once. But who had hired them, for what purpose, he could not begin to guess. Sam gingerly got out of the carriage, wincing from the pounding in his head more than what weak sunlight reached King’s Landing. _Does the snow ever stop?_ he wondered. It was winter, after all, but even so it was early for the snows to fall so often and so heavily this far south.

“Who are you?” someone barked at him suddenly. Sam was too distracted by the white sky to answer. “Oi! Over here!” He heard the snapping of fingers and looked down to see perhaps the ugliest man he’d ever seen looking at him sharply. The sellsword had the bearing of an officer and his armor was of finer make and keep, but nothing could hide the mask of scars a life of battle had made of his face. Nor the nubs it had of his ears.

“Fine, here you go.” Sam said, and his fist flew out. He felt his knuckles find the man’s jaw and the sellsword promptly flew backward into a dozen full sacks of grain. A faint groan sounded from the pile, the man feebly making to rise.

“Ugh…” he muttered, swaying a bit as he spat out what seemed a spoonful of blood. Staggering slightly, he brought his fists up. “Alright, young buck, let’s at it.” he grunted, trying to keep beady brown-black eyes on Sam.

“Hold there, Franklyn. No need to lose a few teeth over an honest misunderstanding.” A portly man with greying hair and trundled over. “Ho, there. Our boisterous brown apple didn’t mean you any harm, lad.” he said to Sam, smiling genially. The word _apple_ teased at his aching brain. “Harry Strickland.” The odd man introduced himself. Evidently, he thought Sam should recognize his name because he turned pink when there was no forthcoming impression of recognition. “Captain-general of the Golden Company.” _Ah, now there’s a name I recognize._

“Oh.” Sam replied. “Uhh, splendid. We need all the swords we can get.” Whatever response this Harry Strickland was expecting, that wasn’t it.

“Just what do you think we’re doing in Westeros?” Sam shrugged.

“Taking the gold some lord or other owes you to support him in these turbulent times?”

“We’re sellswords, not retainers.”

“Then I haven’t the first idea what you’ve abandoned the no-doubt lucrative fighting of the Free Cities and the Disputed Lands for to cross the Narrow Sea.”

“Precisely _because_ it’s not been so lucrative. One day it was business as usual, Myr against Lys, Volantis against everyone- then Daenerys Targaryen turned all on its head when she burned slavery down sure as she did the slavers themselves.”

“You’re against Daenerys, then?”

“Not so much against her as for another. A more fitting claimant to the Iron Throne.” _To a bubbling molten pool, running across the throne room floor._ Harry Strickland did not seem in a great rush to share just who had contracted the Golden Company though, no more than identity of this “claimant” who could apparently put themselves before her in the succession. Sam felt no great urge to regale the man of what had happened in the Red Keep in turn.

“Well, if you’re looking for who’s in charge-” Harry Strickland only looked more lost by the moment.

“You are a Reachman, yes? It was my understanding the Reach is ruled by House Tyrell.” He looked over to the ugly man, still lying in the pile.

“The Tyrells are all dead, killed in the destruction of the Great Sept of Baelor. A vile ploy by Cersei Lannister, herself killed by Ser Jaime Lannister to prevent her sending the rest of King’s Landing the same way.” By then Harry Strickland had gone positively pale, looking so much like a shaken white frog that Sam had to look away to avoid laughing at the man. “I take it your benefactor is somewhat ignorant of the goings on in Westeros, so far removed as he’s been.” The so-called sellsword gaped like a fish plucked from a pond while his men looked on, faces differing in color as well as expression. _What madman would nominate this creature to be captain-general of the most storied sellsword band in the world?_ Another man came through the throng, one the common swords seemed to have a deal more respect for than Harry Strickland. _A Summer Islander,_ Sam saw. _He is not so old as to normally have hair white as a cloud, though._

“I am Balaq, commander of the company’s archers.” Sam saw the goldenheart bow slung over his shoulder.

“Black Balaq, he’s called proper.” one of the men said. _Funny,_ he _looks Westerosi._ _A fair number of them do, actually,_ Sam thought on closer inspection. “Nothing is half so black as the queen’s dragon. Not only in scale, but temper as well.” he replied casually. That seemed to please Balaq, or at least he found it humorous. _Wonder why they call him that. Imaginative lot, these sellswords._

Sam took it upon himself to wake the other lords of the Reach before they could rouse and find themselves the unwilling hosts of a company of sellswords. He played it off as just another nuisance rather than a crisis, shrugging in surly irritation whenever someone inquired as to just who’d flung the Golden Company at King’s Landing.

“Who could afford the Golden Company’s price, though? Free Cities pooling their gold to send them after Daenerys?” Lord Hightower asked from his bed. _Perhaps he’s smarter than I credited him at first, if only just._

“The Golden Company are paid to fight, not to kill. Sellswords, not assassins, my lord.”

“A sellsword is an assassin, only louder and drunker.” Hightower retorted grumpily, standing to dress. The other lords woke in much the same vein, with much grumbling and complaining but little true anger. _It must be a relief,_ Sam pondered. _The wars with each other have stopped, at least for the moment. The first night in a while spent under roofs and in beds for many of them as well._ When he returned to the Tarly townhouse, Talla put the same question forth when she learned what had happened. He waited until Gilly and Little Sam were ushered upstairs by spry Lady Olenna before answering. _Besides, Talla’s smarter asleep than Lord Randyll and Dickon are put together and wide awake._

“The only person I can think of that the Golden Company would be willing to risk so much for is a Blackfyre claimant of some kind or other. Stingy on the details as the captain-general was, he did suggest his benefactor had a better claim than Daenerys. That doesn’t exactly suggest _Blackfyre_ to me.”

“If they’re professing to be a Targaryen, it has to be one of Prince Rhaegar’s children. They would have a better claim than their aunt. But they were killed when King’s Landing was sacked.”

“So the story goes. Then again, dragons were dead and the Others a drunken northern myth. Madder things are happening by far than one endling having dodged death.”

“It can’t be Princess Rhaenys. Everyone recognized her when she and her baby brother were laid out before Robert on the throne.” _A days-old baby, though, that nobody outside the nursery must have gotten more than a passing glance at…_

“Prince Aegon, then. Aegon, the Sixth of His Name, I suppose he accounts himself.”

“Who sailed expecting to find a throne and a queen both waiting for him.” _He’s like to be doubly disappointed, then. The issue of the throne has quite been settled, and she herself has gone on to Dragonstone with Jon._ Daenerys did not strike Sam in the least like a maiden princess in a story, waiting to be rescued by some strapping hero. _Wild creatures need no rescuing, least of all from each other._


End file.
